


Blood Thirsty

by islandgirl_246



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Werewolves Are Known, Family Secrets, Feud, M/M, Mystery, Sheriff is an Argent, Sheriff not a Stilinski
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-25
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-05-28 16:25:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 35,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15053201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/islandgirl_246/pseuds/islandgirl_246
Summary: For centuries vampires and werewolves were kept apart for the safety of both species and more locally, the peace of Beacon Hills. But something strange is happening, and of course, Stiles Stilinski would have to be the catalyst.Never one to accept things as they are, his never-ending curiosity will set in motion events that no one is prepared for – least of all the supernatural community in Beacon Hills . . . however much he regrets that now.





	1. Shifting Realities

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little background to this verse so it starts off making sense.   
> In this verse Peter and Stiles are closer in age – 22 and 17, respectively. Beacon Hills is home to both werewolves and vampires, who exist together through a Government arrangement called The Directive, though there is some measure of segregation “for the sake of the peace”. The specifics of The Directive will be alluded to or explained as we go on.   
> Talia Hale is Alpha. Claudia Stilinski, Mayor for Beacon Hills and known as “the Lagan”, which is what the leader of the Vampires is called. The species don’t like each other but they uphold The Directive for the “greater good”, and as such those at the higher levels are decreed to cooperate.   
> Breaking the laws of The Directive are punishable – in some cases by death.   
> ***Although it starts off with a time split, that’s not how the narrative continues***

**_-Now-_ **

He was in pain, out of breath and running on near empty. He needed to feed. One more wound might be the end of him but he couldn’t stop, he just couldn’t.

Peter had stopped. He’d thought he could talk sense to them, could reason with them. Stiles didn’t even know if he was still alive because he’d turned supernaturally glowing blue eyes at Stiles and told him to run when things went pear-shaped.

And if Stiles stopped now he was good as dead. If he stopped now, the grief might take over and he did not know if he’d have the energy, mentally or physically, to want to survive – not without Peter.

He’d never meant for them to end up here. He should have stayed in his lane, on his side of the aisle; on his side of the territory, of the preserve. Life would have been so much simpler; so much less painful.

He should have done as his dad had done, and accepted his place in the order of things. _His dad_ . . . a fresh wave of grief gripped him at the thought, but he couldn’t focus on that now either. He should have taken a leaf from his dad’s book. But he hadn’t; he didn’t; couldn’t. And because of that, this might very well be the end.

++++++

**_-Eight months ago-_ **

“Oooh, that’s a pretty one,” Trey said, licking his lips and grinning at Peter.

“Yeah, that one always is! It’d bruise beautifully; snap in half almost as easily,” Deucalion answered, equally as viciously. “Let’s fuck with it,” he grinned, and Peter could smell the excitement on him.

Peter’s wolf stood back and sniffed before prowling suddenly and quickly to the forefront of Peter’s consciousness and uttering a growl. The sound bubbled up and out before he could contain it and only served to excite his two friends all the more. He could nearly taste their desire to stir shit up.

He took a step back before he realized it, and when Duke frowned at him he purposely square his shoulders, asserting himself as the leader of this group, even if he would never hold such rank in the Hale pack. That privilege would forever be beyond his reach. He shook off that thought, as his sister sprang to mind. She was not one easily dismissed, and this could go south in the flash of a paw. So for once he made a “smart- _ish_ ” decision.

“Nah, let’s hit the store and go,” he said, affecting a bored air that his wolf definitely didn’t feel as it paced, agitated for some reason.

“Come on, Peter. Where’s your sense of adventure?” Trey goaded, hoping to sway him.

Peter sneered. “It’s put away for the evening, thank you very much. After the fiasco with the last one, Talia would have my balls for lunch if I went anywhere near that thing, considering who it is,” he jerked his head in the direction of the “paleling” across the parking lot from them.

“Aw, fuck. You sure she doesn’t already have your balls, man?” Duke snarked, gesturing crudely with his hand on his crotch and simulating a squeezing gesture for the family jewels.

Peter flashed narrowed, burning, yellow eyes at him. “Fuck you, Duke. You go on if you want to so bad, but I guarantee Tal will make you live to regret it. You heard her after the cafeteria incident. So by all means, go ahead. Me, I’m going to get my fucking cigarettes and go home to a warm bed before a little fun time later,” he wiggled his brows suggestively, conjuring up images of Imogen with her blond hair, big boobs, small waist and willing everything.

“Whore!” Trey snorted.

“Always and willingly,” Peter rejoined teasing, pushing his way through the convenient store doors as the “paleling” stood still where it had frozen from the time it had spotted the crew of werewolves.

Peter cast one last look at the youth’s reflection in the door as it swung close. His wolf wanted to go back – to do what, he didn’t know, but he knew better than to try to find out. Starting shit with that particular vamp was just asking for all kinds of trouble.

Now don’t get Peter wrong, it wasn’t that he was any stranger to trouble or that he didn’t embrace the chaos he usually created. He thrived on his bad-ass reputation and a reveal of a claw and a flash of eyes was all it took to send all kinds of messages to anyone who thought messing with him was a good idea.

It was just that there was _trouble_ , and then there was **_vamp_** **_TROUBLE_**. The former he could handle. But after the campus incident, the latter he could do without . . . for now – at least until Talia, his Alpha and sister, got her panties out of the wad she’d worked them into following his suspension from uni a week-and-a-half ago.

++++++

Stiles swallowed as the wolves rowdily pushed through the doors to the store, laughing and raucous with the jokes, some of which, he knew, were at his expense. He considered his options – continue on his way to complete the errand he was running for Mrs. Hicks, or abandon this place and return later, when the store would likely be wolf-free. At the very least free of these particular wolves.

He’d seen the handsome face, cheekbone, thick brows, blue eyes that flashed gold and ridiculous V-neck Henley and guessed immediately that the leader of the crew was none other than _the_ Peter Hale of the territory’s famous Hale Pack. He’d never met the guy personally, but rumour had it he was training to be pack enforcer and as such was one of the most dangerous werewolves around. Even vampires were not foolish enough to take a flash of eyes from a werewolf lightly, and he’d seen the action a few short moments ago.

Plus, with his enhanced hearing he’d picked up that the bunch was up to no good and walking in there might only stir up trouble and then his mom would have to get involved.

Stiles bit his lips. Glanced at the store one last time before turning around, sticking his hands in his pockets in dejection. He’d go to the supermarket and come back to the pharmacy located in the back of the convenient store. It was the only one that carried the needed supernatural herbs and ingredients for the potions Mrs. Hicks made. If he went home without it there would be questions, and saying that he’d felt threatened by wolves at the store would only cause the kind of trouble that . . . *heavy sigh* . . . and he was enough of a loser as it was.

Stiles ducked his head as he loped his long, skinny, pale form back to his blue baby, hoping the engine would turn over when he turned the key.

++++++

It would be another week before he ran into another Hale again. And this time it was literally, and also the Alpha’s daughter.

He was chatting with Scott, the two goofing off and making fun at each other’s pitiful scoring in the lacrosse practice game a few hours ago, as they strolled idly through the supermarket aisle. Stiles wanted to pick up some snacks on their way to his house for game night.

“I’m telling you, I would have nailed his ass if coach hadn’t put me back on the bench,” Stiles boasted, gesticulating and grinning widely at his friend.

“Yeah, right. You mean you would have nailed him the same way you would have scored if Danny hadn’t knocked you off your game, by looking so appetizing?” Scott said, chuckling and showing a little fang.

Stiles groaned, “For a best friend you suck, you know that?” He rolled his eyes, walking backward facing Scott.

“Like there’s any shame in that,” Scott joked, flashing fangs for real this time, and Stiles laughed, and tripped . . . on air.

“Stiles . . .!” he heard Scott gasp, grin petering off in exclamation and more than a little anxiety.

Ordinarily Stiles was a stickler for observing the rules about keeping to “their side” of the aisle, but he wasn’t paying enough attention, arms flailing as he stepped to the side, and as Scott called a warning, “Look out!”, Stiles crashed right into someone.

“Sorry,” he started, trying to stabilise himself before he realized he was looking into the glowing yellow eyes of a wolf.

Both boys scrambled back, as the wolf growled. “Watch where you’re going, fanger!” she said nastily and the girl behind her sniggered.

The girls were about their age, blond and attractive, both of them. _There should be a law or something against werewolves being this good looking_ , but then there was also flash of teeth – which, not so attractive.

“Why don’t _you_ watch where you’re going? There’s a whole big aisle here. Aren’t your eyes and ears supposed to be super-enhanced? You could have moved out of the way too.” Stiles argued without thinking.

The girl’s face mottled with anger, “And why didn’t you watch what you were fucking doing? That over there, is your side or can’t you see the clear markings?” she grated out, clearly agitated and pointing to the pale yellow markings in the aisle as compared to the green on the wolf side. “ . . . Oh right, you couldn’t, because you were running your fanger mouth and didn’t look where the fuck you were going,” she said getting loud.

Beyond her Stiles could see other shoppers edging out of the way, probably not wanting to get caught in any crossfire if a supernatural fight broke out.

“Call me fanger one more time,” Stiles said through clenched teeth. It was one of the nastier of the derogatory terms aimed at vampires; worse than “paleling” and ‘blood sucker’, but not as bad as ‘blood whore’.

“Oh yeah, what you gonna do about it? Call out to mommy?” she sneered moving forward, head lowered but watching him from under increasingly disappearing brows.

Oh Valhalla, she was shifting. She was actually shifting in the presence of a vampire. Stiles heard a gasp from somewhere nearby. _This was forbidden!_ She was in the process of violating a Directive.

“Hey, look . . .,” he started to backpedal, realizing maybe he needed to take this situation down several notches before it became an _official incident_.

“Laura!” a hard male voice ricocheted through the store like a gunshot.

In three long strides, Peter was at his niece’s side and grasping the back of her neck with a firm, warning hand. He heard her inhale roughly. Her heart was pounding in his ears, but he needed her to pull her shift back, and fast.

“Easy,” he said, almost gently, knowing anything else would get the Alpha heir’s back up.

He moved in front of her, blocking her view of the two vamps and the gathering crowd, lowering his voice for Laura alone, although he knew the two boys’ hearing was equally as good. “You have to calm down and pull it back,” he whispered.

“I’m trying,” Laura said shakily, breathing roughly, “but I can smell them,” she whined.

“Forget them; focus on me, Laura. Listen to my heart and match it. Let your wolf think of home, pack and calm her down . . . that’s it. That’s it.”

Stiles found himself listening to the stucco beat of the wolf’s heart himself. As he watched the girl’s brows started to fill back in. He’d always wanted to ask a werewolf where the eyebrows went, but he’d only seen one shifted in books and on television, and conversations between the races beyond violent spats were still not so commonplace despite the peace.

Young vampires were taught that if a wolf shifted in their presence – apart from breaking Directive, it was a sure warning to run. It was the sure forerunner to certain death.

The girl behind the one named Laura looked scared, eyes blown wide and lips trembling; no trace of her earlier cock-sure attitude. “Peter?” she said once the one named Laura’s breathing slowed.

It was then that Stiles was aware of Scott pulling on his arm. “Let’s go, Stiles. We shouldn’t be here.”

“It’s ok, Erica,” Peter responded, back still to Stiles and Scott like it was no big deal.

Stiles ignored his best friend. “Is she ok?” He felt bad now about goading the wolf, but her attitude had triggered his own response.

Peter swung to the one he held responsible for this spectacle. Talia was surely going to pin the responsibility for this squarely between Peter’s shoulder blades. He should have brought the girls straight home, but he’d wanted cigarettes and condoms.

“What the hell are you playing at? Is this some kind of an experiment to you?” Peter’s voice was hard, deadly.

“What?” Stiles sputtered, squeaked. “I didn’t do anything. It was an accident that just blew out of proportion.” Stiles couldn’t help the flailing hands. It was kinda his signature by now.

Peter prowled forward, smooth, slick and dangerous. His wolf disturbed and . . . _interested_ . . . **_What?!_**

When it registered that his wolf was curious about the vampire in front of them, Peter paused, frowned and sniffed at the vamp. It was skinny, loud . . . gorgeous, and smelled _soooo good_. **_Hold up . . . again, what?!_**

Stiles knew he should move, get the hell away from the animal, but his brain refused to compute and thus his legs stayed put.

Peter’s eyes flickered. He felt them flicker and heard the vampire inhale. Then he smelled it – arousal. From the vampire. It was a spicier mixture to the earlier whiff he’d gotten, but this one seemed to curl into his nostrils. He literally had to shake his head to clear it.

His eyes darted to the dark-haired friend who was now tugging frantically on the paler one’s arm. Not like Peter didn’t know exactly who the pale one was – every wolf knew the Lagan’s heir. The . . . _Mayor’s_ . . . son . . .

That’s when he mentally and physically took a few steps back, because – _hell no!_

The vampire blanched, pale cheeks pinking for a second before the paleness that was genetic to their race returned. The vampire dropped his gaze.

“Let’s go,” Peter said to his pack mates, spun on his heels and got the hell out of there, a tight hand on Laura with Erica chipping close behind.

Of course this was not a retreat. None whatsoever! Peter told himself.

++++++

“What the hell was that?!” Scott yelled at him, as they took the bags of snacks out to the car. He’d been near bubbling as they shakily made their way to the cashier to pay for their snacks, and held it in until now.

“Will you keep your voice down,” Stiles hissed looking around and flashing pointed teeth for a moment.

“You spoke to them; argued with them. You know it’s not allowed.”

“That’s not totally accurate, and _you_ know it.” He gave his friend the dirty side-eye.

If there was one thing Stiles knew well it was _The Directive_. After all his mother had drummed the damn thing into him from the time he could speak or at least understand words, and furthermore had made him recite a portion every night after the werewolf incident when he was seven. He’d never understood the segregation. Still didn’t, even knowing every section of that damn code – maybe especially because of the ridiculous code.

“He’s a wolf, Stiles.”

“Nothing happened, Scott!” he squalked at his firned.

“Really. Nothing?” Scott tapped his nose. “You know better. It’s forbidden! If your mom found out . . .”

“But she won’t, will she, Scott?” Stiles said slowly.

Scott ran a hand through his hair. “You’re playing with fire with those animals.”

“Again, nothing happened! Will you quit blowing this out of proportion?!”

“Oh right. Nothing happened because I was there and he wouldn’t dare. He could have hurt you, you know. Either one of them could have . . .,” he cut that thought abruptly. But his eyes went wide again as he hastily continued in a hissed whisper, “And she was shifting . . . **_shifting_** . . . We should tell someone.”

“Stop! Scott! Geez!”

“Don’t you ‘Scott. . .’ me, in that tone of voice. Have you forgotten what those animals did to Greenberg? He would have gone blood drunk if Coach hadn’t got there just in time. They’re vicious animals who kill!”

“And what the fuck are we, Scott, huh? Are our hands so clean? Are we any less murderous than they are? Have we shed less blood?” Stiles climbed into the jeep slamming the door with passion and jamming the key in the ignition.

Scott sputtered, scrambling up and into the vehicle before his friend in mid-absentminded rambling, left without him; because Stiles was on a roll and Stiles tended to lose focus when he was on a roll.

Stiles revved the engine and threw the jeep into reverse in one motion. “I mean they separate us. Same schools . . .,” he shoved the vehicle into gear, “ . . . same supermarkets, same colleges, but separate classrooms for wolves and vampires; different sides of the same aisles; same classes at different times, despite the fact that we study some of the same things, don’t have enough resources for the splits and have the same human teachers. We’re allowed limited conversation with them, limited association with them . . . fuck, we can’t even use the same facilities at the same times that they do for fear of an ‘incident’.” He lifted his hands from the wheel to emphasise the inverted commas.

“They pretend that this imitation at ‘integration’ proves something, but it doesn’t. You want to tell me how things will ever get any better if they keep segregating us and fucking calling it the ‘greater good’? The _Directive_ is bullshit and it does nothing but breed more hate generation after generation. Are you not tired of living like this? Cycle after cycle of ignorance about each other and calling ourselves developed, enlightened and evolved,” Stiles’ voice had steadily risen and he was now shouting at Scott in the confined space of the jeep as his blood sang with the passion and his fang popped out causing him to lisp heavily.

It was an old argument and the primary one on which he and his mother could not agree. His mom enforced every element of the Directive as it was written, to the letter and without any room for interpretation, dissention or negotiation – certainly not from her own son, the future Lagan.

Stiles was angry, at all of it. But mostly he was angry with himself because for a moment there he’d felt a flicker of attraction to the wolf. Those cold blue eyes and that handsome chin, with trimmed goatie, smooth angular cheekbones and muscles – so many muscles displayed beneath a tight-fitting V-neck. He’d felt himself chub in his jeans when the wolf slinked forward, all smooth, deadly, wolfy grace.

If he’d been smart he would have run, but for a moment he’d completely forgotten who each of them were; what they were.

He sighed. “Let’s just go play fucking video games, ok? I don’t want to talk about this anymore.” He shoved in another gear and the jeep leapt with the grinding of the clutch and Scott wisely kept silent.

++++++

“Should we tell the Alpha,” Erica asked eyes darting from Laura back to Peter as her hands fiddled with the straps of the book bag in her lap.

Laura had shrunk in on herself in the passenger seat the moment they got in.

“No,” Peter grated, remembering whiskey-coloured eyes, pale skin and vivid moles. His wolf paced in the back of his mind, letting out a small whine. It wanted to run a broad tongue across those moles, but Peter had more self-control than that. He demanded that it quiet down so he could think.

“I think we have to. There’s no way they won’t report it,” Erica continued, nerves stinking up inside his car and bringing him back to the present.

“I said no!” he said louder. “And stop that; I can smell you.”

She stopped fidgeting and her eyes dropped from the rearview mirror in which she’d been assessing his responses.

“Dammit,” Peter sighed, “I didn’t mean that Erica.” Now he was snapping at his pack mate. _Way to go, Peter, like she wasn’t afraid enough already._

“I’m sorry, Uncle Peter,” Laura said in a small voice. “I just got so mad and then I couldn’t control it.” Her tone reminded him of a young four-year-old Laura who’d been determined to show everyone that she’d mastered the shift and who had then become stuck in a mid-shift that not even her mother had been able to talk her down from.

“I know, Pet. It’s gonna be ok. You’ll see,” his mind was turning over possible scenarios to make it so.

Laura looked at him, suddenly suspicious of _that_ particular tone. “What are you gonna do?”

The steering wheel groaned under the pressure of Peter’s clenched hands. _Something_ , he thought. _He had to do something._


	2. Peter's . . . Something

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“Then I guess you’re here to find out why I haven’t had your niece seized by Sheriff John for the incident in the store?”_   
>  _Peter growled, low and threatening, assuming his beta form, the words shocking him out of his haze. “What do you want?”_   
>  _He knew he was in a corner, at the mercy of this thing who would no doubt demand its pound of flesh._

He waited exactly three days before he sought him out. Followed his nose to the Mayor’s private residence and hid, ears peeled, nose primed.

Laura and Erica had been on edge for days waiting for the axe to fall, and Talia was getting suspicious. Peter needed to be sure. He didn’t like owing anyone and this was stretching it close. Owing a vamp was a concept beyond what his mind could conceive, furthermore accept.

He needed to make sure neither the boy nor his friend wouldn’t utter a word against Laura. The vampires could use this to strike at their Alpha and it would all be Peter’s fault – because he had wanted to look cool and get laid. He didn’t even particularly like cigarettes.

As he settled in to listen, he heard an engine rev to life. The Mayor was leaving. _Maybe luck was on his side after all. If only he could now figure out a way to get to the boy._

The mansion near the centre of town was Mayor Claudia Stilinski’s official residence, but this more modest house at the edge of the preserve was where the Lagan called home; where her son lived. The mansion was used for official meetings; this house was where she had lived with her husband . . . before. Sometimes Peter had wondered if she maintained it as a way to thumb her nose up at the werewolves by living at the very edges of their territory. Taunting them to do something about it. She was certainly petty enough.

Peter crept from the trees examining the obstacle before him. All he had to do was find a way to get to the vamp now. There was sure to be electricity in this tall fence surrounding the property and a state of the art security system.

He waited another few minutes before he moved closer to the fence. He listened for any other heartbeats nearby. It would not do for him to be caught sneaking around the Lagan’s house. The buzzing suddenly stopped and a small gate near where he stood snicked open with an audible click. _Was this some kind of trap?_ Even if it was, he could easily overpower a vampire, he thought. After all that was known fact.

He’d gone no more than five steps before the back door threw open.

“I can hear you, you know,” the boy said, plopping down on his butt in the middle of the opened doorway as light spilled around him.

And Peter lost his breath. There was an ethereal quality about him, sitting there surrounded by light which was reflecting off his pale, pale, skin like a supernatural glow. Peter was helpless to do anything but move forward some more.

“I’m assuming you’re not here to see my mom?” he asked matter-of-factly.

Still no words came.

“Then I guess you’re here to find out why I haven’t had your niece seized by Sheriff John for the incident in the store?”

Peter growled, low and threatening, assuming his beta form, the words shocking him out of his haze. “What do you want?”

He knew he was in a corner, at the mercy of this thing who would no doubt demand its pound of flesh.

“Oh stop being dramatic,” the boy tutted, cutting Peter’s growl mid-rumble. “I don’t want anything. It was an accident. I didn’t mean to do what I did and I know the consequences are not hers to bear. So we are in the clear. I haven’t said anything to mom and Scott won’t either, and any human by-standers will take their cues from what we do. So you needn’t worry.”

“And I’m supposed to trust you? Why would I be that stupid?”

Stiles sighed heavily, audibly and got up. Peter heard him swallow, from his position crouched just beyond the stream of light from the open door, before the vamp responded, “You know what? Whatever. I have no interest in getting some girl killed because of a bullshit feud that has nothing to do with anything and perhaps isn’t even accurate in its documentation. Whether you believe me or not doesn’t matter. Consider this my apology for starting the damn thing in the first place. I just thought you would . . .,” he sighed again. “Never mind; whatever,” and turned away, closing the door behind him, effectively leaving Peter in the dark.

Peter stood still, shocked. A _vampire_ had done _them_ a favour – taken the blame for an incident that could easily have sparked new bloodshed and all because he thought the incident was _his_ _fault_? It didn’t make any sense. None whatsoever, and it baffled Peter.

Vampires were so damn hard to read. Their emotions didn’t carry normal smells – at least not all their emotions, he thought, remembering the store. You just couldn’t tell a lie by their heartbeats because they didn’t have regular rhythms – something to do with their biological make up and genetics. Besides, he had little experience around them so it all left him more than a little unsettled.

Peter turned and jogged back toward the gate. As he pulled it close and started towards woods he heard the sound of the gate relocking and the electricity surging back through the connections. Stiles had clearly watched until he’d exited and was safe. _But why?_

As he set a steady pace for home, he had more questions than answers about this strange vampire called Stiles – who for all intents and purposes was the equivalent of Laura to the vampire community of Beacon Hills. He was expected to take up his mother’s mantle when the Lagan of Beacon Hills eventually gave up her “throne”.

So many questions - _What had he thought Peter would do? And about what? And what did he mean that the feud was bullshit? And when had he begun thinking of vampires as anything other than an “it”?_

Peter frowned harder as he picked up the pace on the way home. He hated this feeling of disquiet. It always led to trouble.

++++++

_Faster, faster. Run faster._

Vampires were fast; damn fast, but unfortunately still far from the fastest on de ole supernatural scale, as the wendigo chasing him was proving quite adequately. Besides, he hadn’t even ever heard of a wendigo in Beacon Hills before now. Between the wolves and the vampires, there weren’t many things that were stupid enough to trespass with ill-intent – though this current moment was severely testing those previously held assumptions.

He heard the thing squeal again and dodged just moments before its huge claws would have opened his spleen with a single swipe. The dodge cost him though because he lost a bit of momentum to a stumble, falling face first and swearing a blue streak. His limbs were forever getting him into tangles.

He rolled out of the second attempt at injury as his brain ticked over. _Would there be anything left of his corpse for his mother to identify, furthermore bury? Did wendigoes – was that even the right word for their pluralization, though it seemed logical – but did they also consume the bones?_ No one ever said how much they’d eat if they caught up with you. Just a dire warning not to get caught.

A hysterical, panicked chuckle emitted from his throat before the roar registered. Just as the filthy, smelly, disgusting thing turned to pounce on him, a powerful snarl rend the air and the wendigo went crashing to the ground with a huge grey and black wolf on its back, claws buried deep, and jaw clenched between the wendigo’s neck and wing.

Stiles’ extremely inquisitive brain paused to wonder at the taste before he registered that a werewolf was apparently fighting the thing that was a second ago about to claim his life. _He should run._ He should run and keep running and let them duke it out. He was no match for either.

But his legs refused to activate in a manner necessary to produce movement.

The wendigo shook the animal from its back and swiped, opening a deep wound along the wolf’s left leg. Stiles thought he saw a flash of bone through the raggedly torn, bloody flesh, but beyond the roar that could easily have been as much pain as anger, the wolf refused to give in, using its strong back legs to launch another attack on the beast. It all happened so fast, that even the wendigo was caught off-guard, giving the wolf just enough time to latch onto the beast’s throat with those amazingly strong jaws.

Stiles watched in a state of perpetual shock. If there was one thing all vampires knew it was that a wolf’s jaws meant almost certain death for their kind. There’d been enough evidence of it over the past years of their feud – before The Directive was issued and ruthlessly implemented when the fighting spilled into human populations.

One toss of its head, Stiles could hear the tearing, smell the blood. _Oh, the blood._ His fangs dropped automatically, and the wendigo’s final attempt at a scream was ruthlessly cut off by gurgling, twitching and then silence. When the silence fell, it was so absolute that Stiles’ ears, which had been trained on the rapidly beating hearts, hurt for a second before the rustling of leaves in the tops of the trees, and the ragged breathing of the wolf penetrated his sound bubble.

The wolf stood over the corpse as if making sure it was dead. Then just as suddenly that golden gaze turned on him, as a howl rend the air at a distance. Stiles had enough presence of mind to scramble back from his sprawl on the ground, as the wolf limped forward, favouring its injured front leg, but eyes intense. It lifted its head and howled in response to whatever that previous call had meant.

Stiles swallowed heavily and if he had a normal human heartbeat it would have been through the roof by now. Surely this meant more of them were on the way. He had to get out of wolf territory now.

The animal continued its prowl forward, meters from where Stiles was backed, still on his butt, against a tree. He wondered if he got up to run if it would give chase. It probably would.

The wolf growled, low and deep and Stiles covered his head with his arms. _Protect the neck. Always protect the neck and chest_ , his mind chanted as he crunched forward awaiting certain death. At least wolves seldom ate vampires. They killed them, sure. But there’d be enough left for his mom to bury. That was something, at least.

Not like with dad . . .

The bite didn’t come but the animal continued growling. Eventually the growling stopped, and Stiles removed his hands hesitantly and just looked at the wolf. It stepped forward again, but this time seemed to realise it was injured and whimpered as it sank to the ground, rump making a thump a few inches from Stiles’ feet.

It took Stiles another couple seconds to work up enough courage to move and he eased onto his all-fours, and crept toward the wolf, which continued to watch him steadily. As he got near, the wolf uttered another growl, weaker than the others before.

“You’re hurt. Let me see,” Stiles said softly, reaching out a hand palms up in supplication. He really should be getting out of there but this was his doing. _Damn his curiosity._

The wolf snarled.

“Stop that!” Stiles issued sharply, surprising himself enough that he swallowed the following squeak, realising what he’d said, and to whom. But to his immense surprise the animal whined and went silent, but watched him just as closely, yellow eyes filled with suspicion.

“Ok, ok,” he whispered to himself. “Don’t panic. Don’t panic. If it wanted to kill you, you’d be dead,” he continued to babble as he moved closer but glancing around and listening out for other wolves. “I hope your pack won’t begin chomping on my squishy bits if they get here before I can get away; but I just can’t leave you like this.”

Was he mistaken or did the wolf just narrow its eyes and snuffle at what he was saying?

++++++

 _Idiot!_ It was the first clear thought that came to the wolf. It just wasn’t sure whether it meant itself or the silly vamp who’d almost got itself eaten. Now the thing was gibbering to itself about the wolf wanting to eat it.

Sure it smelled nice . . . _really nice_ . . . but still, it was a vampire and that was a definite no-no. Even as a wolf it knew that.

It had already told the pack it was ok, knowing his fight with the wendigo would have sent confusing signals down the pack bond. It was sure there was no one coming, at least the wolf hoped so. And since its other half had spent the last near two weeks since suspension trying to work his way back into their sister’s good graces, attacking a vamp while The Directive held was just too stupid to consider.

The paleling crept closer still and finally whispered, “Please don’t eat me,” before laying a hand on the wolf’s face.

The hand was cold, not surprising; but the frisson of something that vibrated down its back raised its hackles and it almost growled again. That smell . . . that fucking sweet smell that was a cross between the caramel grandmother used to make and Auntie Helen’s sinful cinnamon cookies, wrapped around both man and wolf enticingly.

The wolf’s eyes drifted shut, near drunk on just the smell of it . . . the smell of him – this vampire who was too damn close and whom the man now deep inside had started thinking of as “him”. But the wolf couldn’t stop the whimper when the vampire lifted the leg to look at the injury.

The wolf’s eyes flew open again and while something in its mind said this should not be happening, it couldn’t get its body to move away. It gazed in askance at the boy, not sure what the hell was going on.

++++++

“You’re healing already. Good, good. I wasn’t sure how wounds from a wendigo would affect your ability to heal, but this is good,” Stiles said, realising he really was monologuing to a werewolf, in wolf form, but powerless to stop.

He stripped off his plaid button-down without thinking, pressing it into the wound, leaving his torso covered only in a thin T-shirt. The wolf whimpered but still didn’t pull away from him or try to attack. _Progress! This was good!_

He heard the wolf snort and thought the animal raised a brow at him, looking from the shirt pressed to its leg and back to his face.

“What?” Stiles asked, puzzled.

When the wolf snuffled, Stiles’ mouth dropped open. “I’ll have you know this is . . . was one of my favourite shirts. I’ve been told it brings out the colour in my eyes, _for your information_ . . . and if you’re going to be so critical about my superior fashion sense, guess what, this blood won’t wash out, so you can always replace my damn shirt,” he rattled off, slightly irritated that the animal was disparaging his clothing.

Stiles froze when he felt wetness on his hand. Wetness associated with the wolf’s pink, apologetic tongue.

++++++

The wolf froze.

In the back of its mind Peter knew they’d both done quite enough. He forced himself to the forefront, instigating the change he should have from the very beginning. If he allowed his wolf to continue lord only knew what else it would do.

The vampire scrambled back as Peter’s bones began to snap and pop, and the hair melded into skin and then limbs and then full human – well almost.

“Peter Hale!” the boy whispered, staring at him, mouth open and eyes wide.

“Who else were you expecting?” he asked, pushing to his feet and checking the wound which was now little more than a closing cut along his inner arm.

He turned to look at the boy again and watch as a flash of bright colour touched his cheeks before the paleness returned.

Peter smirked, knowing he cut a handsome picture, especially naked. “You’re blushing,” he said, looking around before going to a nearby tree.

“Am not,” Stiles stuttered. “Vampires do not possess the necessary warm blood flow to cause a blush.”

“Tell that to your red cheeks.”

Peter rustled around at the base of a tree about 40 metres away before he found what he was looking for. He dragged on the track pants and T-shirt before returning to the vampire.

“Wait, you have clothes hidden in the woods? Holy shit, that’s awesome, dude!” Stiles gaped.

“Don’t ever call me dude. What are you doing here anyway? You know these woods are off-limits to your kind without express permission of our Alpha. And she would have warned me if such permission was granted.” Peter folded his hands and straightened his back to assume a commanding height.

Stiles finally got to his feet, and to Peter’s consternation they were almost the same height.

“I, ah . . .” He swallowed. “I was looking for something . . .,” the vamp tried again, fidgeting.

“In our woods?”

“It’s really not that important. I should be going anyway . . ., in case, you know?” he began to back away. “Thanks for the . . . you know . . .”

“Saving your neck from that thing, you mean?” Peter asked amused. “And you’re not going anywhere until you answer my question. What were you looking for?”

Stiles eyes darted around as if looking to run. Peter’s stance told him he would chase him down though, so he resigned himself to the knowledge that he had two choices – be honest, or suffer the consequences of possibly having it revealed that he’d broken a Directive.

“Shit,” he said under his breath.

“Heard that,” Peter added, “and I’m still listening whenever you wanna tell me why you’re out here.”

Stiles eyes zeroed in on Peter’s impressive blues. “Me? What about you? How’d you show up at that exact moment? No one comes out this far.”

Stiles heard Peter’s heart thump and the werewolf’s eyes shifted away.

Stiles’ brows shot up at the sound. He grinned. “Were you following me, Peter Hale?”

“No!” he said too quickly, knowing that he’d allowed his questions to be derailed. This was a particularly prickly and tricky boy.

Stiles’ scent went thick.

“I smelled you,” Peter said absently, then zipped his lips shut and took an involuntary step back.

Stiles began to look worried. “From where?”

If the werewolves were able to smell him in the woods, then they’d know this wasn’t his first trip into forbidden territory. Furthermore it could cause more issues if others were near. His goose was cooked if that was the case and it didn’t matter whether Peter reported him or not if the wolves’ sense of smell was so good that they immediately knew he was in their territory.

“I was just out for a run.” Peter found himself wanting to reassure. “I don’t think anyone else could smell it.”

Stiles’ brow furrowed. “Why? And why did you fight that thing?”

“What was I supposed to do, let it kill you?” Peter said, ignoring the first question asked.

His wolf whined in the back of his mind, disturbed at the very idea. He didn’t know how to explain what Stiles’ smell did to him because he didn’t understand it himself. And the last thing he was going to do was tell one of the main supernatural enemies to the Hale pack that his smell muddled Peter’s brain.

“Why not? Isn’t that what any of the others would have done?”

“Shut up, you know nothing about my family,” Peter snarled, but to his surprise, instead of scampering at the show of aggression, Stiles stepped forward, eyes turning blood red.

“Don’t you raise your voice and snarl at me. What else am I supposed to think when every time one of us gets near one of you it turns into a pissing match? Shouldn’t I assume one dead vampire is as good as any other?”

“So what, you paint us all with the same brush because we’re all animals to you!?” Peter returned just as impassioned.

The two stood still, literally in each other’s face panting and filled with a riot of emotions.

“I didn’t know your eyes could do that,” Peter said numbly.

Stiles quickly closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. “Only when we get too emotional . . . or feed.” When his eyes popped open again they were that warm whiskey brown that Peter felt he would probably see in his dreams tonight.

“Sorry,” Stiles said, eyes falling to the forest floor. “I have no right to go off at you like this. I’m the one trespassing after all.

“I shouldn’t have turned aggressive like that.” _What?_ Peter’s mind stumbled.

“Maybe the problem is neither of us have ever been taught any better about how to handle a simple conversation with the other.”

“You do know this is forbidden? That we are breaking so many codes right now that we could both be exiled for this or worse?”

Stiles scoffed. “Believe me, I know . . . It’s dumb, but I know, every single line and phrase of _The Directive_.”

“Me too . . . Your mom?”

Stiles nodded. “Yours too?”

“Yeah, kinda. Mom, before . . .” Peter trailed off because everyone knew how his mother, his previous Alpha had died.

Stiles eyes fell as he licked his lips and figeted, their conversation bringing to the fore too many memories of their species’ sordid pasts. Peter’s eyes followed the pink tongue as Stiles tucked it back beneath those pale-pink lips.

“You should go. I don’t want to test fate any more today than we already have.”

“Uh, yea . . . right . . .” Stiles’ voice had gone breathy and for a moment he looked unsure. “Well, thanks. For saving my life.”

Stiles began walking back the way he’d come.

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten you haven’t told me what you were looking for.”

Stiles whipped around in a flash, a quick grin on his face, eyes mischievous. “I guess you’ll just have to find out next time.”

Peter’s heart thumped at the suggestion of a repeat of this, and he was sure Stiles’ eyes had dipped to his chest at the sound.

The vampire giggled then took off running.

++++++

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Peter?” a voice asked suddenly from behind him.

The question scared the shit out of him and he spun, trying to think of an excuse that would not end with him shredded.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not sure of an update schedule yet. Leave a note if you feel like. Thanks for reading.


	3. Plausible Deniability

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Peter woke up shifted, with no knowledge of where he was or how he’d got there – until the smell hit him – caramel and cinnamon. **Fuck!**_
> 
> _He needed to have a serious word with his wolf. It was going to get them both fucking killed._

“Laura!?” Peter asked as he came face to face with his niece.

“What are you doing, Peter?” her voice was scared; deathly so.

He had no words.

“I told mom I’d come find you. She’s in a meeting. Most of the pack was ready to come find you when we felt the alarm from your bond, but then you told us everything was ok. You’re lucky I came alone or you could’ve been killed on the spot for this; or at the very least exiled from the territory. He’s a vampire, Peter!”

“Nothing happened, Laura.” He tried to keep his voice level with a calm he certainly did not feel.

“Really? Then why can I smell blood on you? Blood and that vamp?”

Peter swallowed. She was only five years younger than he was, but she was going to be Alpha someday, and he was the main one who’d been teaching her to give no quarter in their training.

“The blood is because of the wendigo you passed.” He tried for dismissive and couldn’t be sure he’d succeeded when her eyebrows raised, almost a mirror of his own when he pulled that particular expression.

“The wendigo you killed because of the vampire; the vampire who was trespassing on our territory . . . Did you bring him here?” her question was asked quietly, suspiciously.

“You know better!” Peter snarled, bristling.

“Do I? A couple days ago I wouldn’t have thought my uncle would cavort and converse so freely with our enemy, or even save the life of one of them.”

“Have you so quickly forgotten that he saved yours first? Saved ours!?” Peter growled. “And less than a week ago. So don’t you start pretending that codes weren’t broken then; that when he allowed you, allowed all of us to walk away after the supermarket when all he had to do was just utter a word to his mother, that we all didn’t contribute to dismissing The Directive!”

“But you’re attracted to him,” Laura whined this time, quietly.

“I’m not,” Peter denied vehemently.

Laura tapped her nose. “His ears may be better than even ours, but nobody surpasses us in the smell department. I could smell it across the clearing, Peter, and you didn’t even hear or see me because your senses were all wrapped up in him. That’s dangerous, uncle.”

She stepped into him, laid her head against his chest. “I’m not scolding Peter, I’m worried.”

Peter wrapped arms around her. He knew she was right. How could he not have known she was there? And Stiles, neither had Stiles.

“Nothing happened, Laura and nothing’s going to.”

Laura shook her head. “You wouldn’t be so quick to say that if you heard what I just did.” She placed a spread palm against his chest, right over his heart and he could say nothing to dispute her claim.

Finally she sighed, pulling out of his embrace. “We need to take care of this carcass and you need to burn these clothes. No one else should be allowed to smell them. After that we need to go for a run and a little rough-housing to get rid of his smell before we get home . . . You need to be careful, Peter. Really . . . careful.” The fear was back in her eyes.

He swallowed heavily. “I know. I will, I promise.”

He felt a momentary surge of pride at her devising strategy to deal with the situation. He was teaching her well. He ignored the guilt that asked exactly how well he was teaching her to lie to their Alpha and pack by extension.

++++++

Laura nodded satisfied. Peter was her favourite and she didn’t know what she would do if anything happened to him.

They both stripped and set off to sniff out something to set light to the clothing from amongst the resources they had hidden throughout the preserve. Such hidden treasures came in handy in moments such as this, and had been Peter’s suggestion some years back . . . after the tragedies that forced the institution of The Directive.

They also needed somewhere to bury the wendigo’s body.

Nudity was nothing new to werewolves, and with their clothing gone, it all had to be done sans attire, which took them nearly half-an-hour. Once that was done they shifted and took off through the trees towards the river.

All the while, the vampire was never far from Peter’s wandering thoughts.

++++++

“Where’ve you been?”

Stiles jumped and screamed, flailing as he turned from the door he had just snuck through to face his mother, standing in the kitchen, hands akimbo.

“Mom! Dearest mother. You nearly scared ten years off me, if such a thing was possible with our kind . . . What are you doing here? Thought I wasn’t going to see you again until tomorrow.”

“Something came up . . . but you didn’t answer my question. Where were you?”

“Just went out, you know . . .”

“Scott called. I thought maybe that’s where you would be until he rang . . .”

Stiles was immediately grateful he hadn’t lied and said he was at Scott’s. But when he remained silent, Claudia sighed. “Stiles, it’s an election year. You know what that means. People are going to be more critical of everything you do, so you can’t just go wandering off and causing trouble.”

Stiles felt his throat constrict with guilt.

“This is going to be my hardest election yet,” his mom, the Mayor, continued, “and those wolves would love nothing better than for us to lose the seats on the Governing Council. It already looks like Councilman Granger is going to lose his because of that damn scandal. I can’t have anything else derailing our plans to hold onto power at the top. It means our very survival, honey.”

His mother walked forward, pulling him into a tight hug. “I need you kiddo.”

Stiles swallowed. “Of course, mom.”

He knew this particular rodeo well, and hated it passionately. The constant one-upmanship between vampires and werewolves at the governance level was vicious, tiring and depressing. And very painful for Stiles, whom people scrutinised and used as a verbal punching bag more each time elections came around. He just wanted normal youthful experiences – without the cocktail parties, banquets, the opening ceremonies, promotional campaigns, photo-ops complete with big, fake smiles and most of all, the gossip mags. _Why couldn’t he just be normal?_ Nothing around him had been simply _normal_ since dad . . .

He wondered if things would have been different if he was still here. Dad had been the one whom he could talk freely to; but, he also knew his mother loved him. She just sometimes didn’t understand him.

“You smell funny.” She lowered her nose to his hair but he was pulling away before she could really pick up on what he smelled like. “Is that blood I smell?” Claudia reared back, eyes bleeding red, brows lowered.

“I just cut myself, that’s all. It’s already healed,” Stiles quickly fibbed. He’d gotten to be an expert at lying – little white ones and the bigger major ones – over the years. Only vampires knew how to check for lies amongst each other, so he’d known since age seven and the vampire scandal that he’d need to be even better at it.

She just watched him, looking for tell-tale signs of subterfuge. She didn’t always know anymore when her son was telling the truth. So without any proof to the contrary, she only warned, “You need to be more careful. You should feed. Replace what you lost.”

Claudia glanced at her watch. “I have to get back to the office. I just came to tell you we are dining with the Martins and Whittmores tomorrow night and I need you to be on your best behavior.”

Stiles groaned. “I will, if that douche isn’t there.”

“Stiles . . . they’re engaged, and he is a Whittmore, so yes, Jackson will be there, as will Lydia. Can you just try please?” She reflected on the fact that anything to do with the two usually resulted in rebellion from her son and it was becoming tiresome.

“Shouldn’t you be giving him this speech? I was minding my own business last time. I didn’t ask to be assaulted by the asshole and his bunch of Neanderthals, or be accosted by his blond bimbo princess.”

“Language!”

“And no one can convince me that fucking strawberry colour isn’t from a bottle,” he said derisively, ignoring the reprimand.

“Stiles! Whether you like it or not Jackson is one of us and the Martins and Whittmores are very important financiers for my campaign. Last year’s shenanigans can be swept under the rug as teenaged, juvenile antics, but you’re almost 18 now, and with these elections people will begin to take more note of your place in our hierarchy; the legacy you begin to build. You can’t keep behaving like a child, honey.”

Stiles sputtered, pulling out of his mother’s reach. “Me? I was the one they shoved naked in a fucking locker and left for over two hours, remember? He deserved worse than a torched car, and I’m still not saying I know anything about what happened to the douche-mobile, regardless of what the strawberry bimbo said.”

Claudia groaned, suddenly tired. “Stiles, they are your classmates and members of our community. In the future they will be your subjects. Whether they are loyal ones or what role they play will be determined by your actions now” he voice was steadily rising. “It’s time you started acting like the rank you hold. You’re heir! Act like it and I’m not having this conversation anymore!”

She breathed out heavily when she saw the anger blazing in his eyes. She tried a different tact. “Look, you can invite Scott if you want, ok?”

 _‘Why can’t you be more like Scott?’_ The memory of those words were still ripe in Stiles’ mind, currently blinded by rage as he was, and with his emotions already high, the blow back was inevitable.

“Right, I forgot – the perfect son you always wished you had.” Stiles wrenched himself away and stomped towards the stairs to hide the hurt sparkling in his eyes. He still hadn’t forgiven his mother’s hurtful words of last year. It wasn’t that he blamed or disliked Scott – he was who he was, a peacemaker and dispute resolver. _Was it too much to ask for a parent that accepted him as he was, without alterations? His dad had . . ._

Claudia threw up her hands in defeat, wishing if only for the sake of her son, she could feel like what she’d said at the time didn’t have merit. She would take back the word for the hurt they’d caused, but at the end of the day she felt a certain guilt that she’d meant them then and still did. She tried her best not to envy Melissa, but somehow always failed.

++++++

Peter woke up shifted, with no knowledge of where he was or how he’d got there – until the smell hit him – caramel and cinnamon. **_Fuck!_**

He needed to have a serious word with his wolf. It was going to get them both fucking killed.

What he didn’t understand was why the boy was wrapped around the wolf like a barnacle, in what Peter was now certain was Stiles’ bed, in the Mayor’s residence. Pressing forward to assert his consciousness on the wolf, he quickly eased himself out from beneath the boy. But how could he get out? He was in wolf form and was sure the security system would be active – including the electrified fence. If he was to turn back into his human form, he’d still be naked . . . in the Mayor’s house . . . with the Mayor’s son . . . who was a vampire.

_Fuck his life._

Whichever way he looked at this, he was surely and veritably fucked.

“Would you keep it down? Your heartbeat is enough to wake the dead.”

The wolf rolled his eyes at the lame attempt at humour. Even half-asleep the boy still had a hell of a mouth on him.

Stile was awake, even if not completely alert. He began to sit up slowly. “I guess you’re panicking cause it’s morning and you need to go, right?”

The wolf whined. _As if that was the only consideration here!_

“Don’t worry, my _mother’s_ not here.”

The way Stiles said it made the wolf cock his head.

“Just thanks for last night. Next time call so you’re not out there pacing by the fence and whining up a storm. Wouldn’t do for the neighbours to see or hear you.”

When the wolf seemed to frown, he added quickly, “ . . . oh right, you don’t have my number. It’s . . .,” and Stiles rattled off the number. “Hope you can remember that, when you’re, you know, less wolfy. Also, it’s kinda cool and kinda creepy how you knew to be here last night.”

Stiles had been in tears by the time his ears picked up the sound enough to realize that the wolf was at his fence, pacing. How Peter had known he needed comfort, he didn’t want to ask. But the smile on his face now was soft.

Both Peter and his wolf liked it. _Fuck, concentrate Peter!_ Peter shook himself mentally, and growled low and soft.

“Right, right.” Stiles hopped out of bed and the wolf scoffed at the vintage Dead Pool pyjamas. “Oh shut it, you fashion critic. You’re the one who’s naked!”

_Well, the vampire had a point there._

++++++

Peter ran through the woods at a deathly pace, stopping ever so often to roll in the brush, some dirt and through a stream or two before splashing heavily into the river.

He could still smell Stiles, but he wasn’t sure anymore if it was just that the smell was somehow ingrained in his nostrils or something more dangerous, like the smell of vampire on him.

He heard the bark and looked up. Laura’s white wolf was standing on the bank of the river. She growled at him.

God, he was soooo going to owe her for this.

++++++

He dropped his bag on the floor by the kitchen island where he normally ate his breakfast and cut into the pancakes, eggs, bacon and toast on the plate laid before him. He was ravenous.

Laura was sitting quietly at the kitchen table eating with other pack youth who were heading off to school, college or nursery.

“Soooo . . . ,” Duke drawled suggestively, then sidled up to him whispering, “Did she put out?”

Peter stuffed another pancake in his jaws to keep from replying.

“And who would she be?” Talia’s voice came sweetly from behind them.

Peter swallowed involuntarily and began to cough. Laura sliced an angry glance in his direction before he flashed eyes at her to calm her heartbeat and her scent. She still had a ways to go before she was lie-proof, though she’d been getting better at it. He’d have to beef up the lessons a bit.

“Hmmm, brother dearest?” Talia walked claws up his back before they slid back into perfectly manicured nails that she then ran through his hair in the way she knew annoyed him. “Who were you with until the late hours of this morning – especially after that wendigo incident yesterday? And don’t say Imogen, she called.”

“I was . . . out. Since when do I need to check in about whom I’m with?” _Deflection_ , he could do this. She’d eventually get tired of him running in circles with his belligerence and let it go. She always did.

“Since you got your ass suspended from college for two weeks and then had a run in with a stray creature in our preserve yesterday, remember that? You can’t just disappear on us overnight after that, brother.”

_Oh shit. Ok, maybe another tactic was needed for this._

He stuffed a strip of bacon in and followed it with toast, giving his brain a second to come up with a believable lie.

“I’m not going to get a visit or call from the police today, am I, Peter?”

He swallowed his mouthful with a sip of coffee. “Tal . . . I promised I would stay out of trouble and I have. No pranks. I just . . . I just needed air, so my wolf went for a run. I couldn’t settle. I needed to make sure the preserve was safe.”

Talia straightened, at once becoming the Alpha with security of her pack on her mind. “And is it? Do we need to arrange more patrols, especially after that wendigo got in here?”

Peter made a conscious effort not to give anything away. “I think that was a one-off incident, but I’ll keep a closer eye on our more distant borders and take Ralph and Cordon with me next time,” he addressed the Alpha, hoping she’d approve of his taking initiative and trust him to take care of it.

“What am I, Swiss cheese?” Duke said affronted.

Peter scoffed. Duke was shit at patrols. Too keyed up and ready to kill anything that even encroached on Hale land. It wouldn’t do to have him sniffing anywhere Stiles might have been, at least not until Peter got the wily vampire to tell him what he was searching for and why.

Talia watched him steadily. He knew this look. She’d perfected it from their mother, but unlike mom, Talia would never get him to sweat over it. He’d cut the teeth of his first lie with their mother, amid the said ‘death eyes’ and she’d never known it.

“I know I’ve been harder on you lately, Peter, but so much is expected of you. You’re almost 23 now, and if you become Pack Enforcer at the end of this year when you finish your studies, there’s going to be a lot more responsibility with the safety of us all resting on your shoulders. I just want you prepared because I know you’d never forgive yourself if something happened to any of us on your watch.”

Guilt settled heavily in Peter’s stomach, souring his appetite for the rest of his breakfast but he forced himself not to show it and to continue eating.

“I love you, baby brother, and everything I do is to prepare you for what you must become.” She ran fingers through his hair again and this time he didn’t even react. She kissed his forehead before running a hand over Duke’s neck, scenting her beta.

Duke inclined his head to the Alpha before she moved over to scent the rest of the pack. Peter watched as the younger ones giggled and preened under the Alpha’s attention. She was a good leader, a good Alpha to all of them – fair, if a little autocratic at times – but she loved her pack, and Laura had the potential to be an even better matriarch.

He resolved within himself to forget about the paler than pale vampire that he was sure his wolf wanted and whom, for some strange reason, he was beginning to want too. That way only lay heartache and certain death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading.


	4. Control

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _She crawled over the centre console into his lap and tried to devour his face._
> 
> _And Peter really wished he could feel something other than revulsion. Wished he could at least summon a woody for what it meant, at the very least. But when a growl erupted from his wolf who would not be contained a second more, Imogen squeaked and scrambled back against the dashboard._
> 
> _He knew his eyes were glowing yellow and he was beginning to shift._
> 
> __  
>  **Fuck!**   
> 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant to update twice last week, but wasn't happy with the chapter, so I picked it apart and started again. Bit more pleased with this cause it gives insights into Talia and Peter's relationship.  
> Ended up longer than I thought, but enjoy!

“So, who is she?” Trey asked from the backseat next to Laura and Erica, whom Peter always dropped to the high school on his way to university. Duke held pride of place as always in the passenger seat.

“Who’s who?” Peter glanced into the rear-view, scanning the street to see whom Trey had caught sight of on their journey.

“The chick you were with last night, of course,” Duke drawled, as if Peter was being deliberately obtuse. “Surely you don’t expect those of us who know you so well to believe you were out prowling the preserve _all night? Alone!?_ ”

Peter forced his tense muscles to relax. “There’s nothing to tell. I wouldn’t lie to our Alpha.”

“Oh bullshit. You shouldn’t – you shouldn’t lie to our dear Alpha, but you fucking would,” Trey scoffed.

Duke turned in his seat to look at Laura. “Where was he really, Laura? I know you know something.”

Laura shifted and Erica darted a quick, puzzled look at her pack sister and best friend.

“Cut it out will you?!” Peter snapped before the focus on Laura turned into closer scrutiny. “I needed to breathe so I took off to the far borders of the preserve, our territory. There is and was no girl, ok? And we are **_not_** discussing me _theoretically_ lying to Talia ever again. Got that?”

“Woah, buddy. Sure. Don’t get all pissy on us. It was just a joke,” Trey pouted a bit.

But Peter saw calculation flash in Duke’s eyes before he swung his impressive ride into Beacon Hills High to set the girls out. Parked two vehicles away was a blue jeep he recognized and was glad his windows were up with the AC on and there was no sight, or smell of Stiles Stilinski. The vampire was turning out to be an apparent werewolf-nip extraordinaire, at least to Peter’s wolf, and there was no telling what the fuck his wolf would do if it even sniffed, better yet caught sight of the vamp.

He pulled quickly out of the school yard, with Duke giving him lengthy and penetrating side glances, and Trey silently brooding in the back.

Of all of them though, Trey was the least likely to hold a grudge for too long, or insist on knowing details of something Peter wished to keep to himself. Trey knew what a vault Peter could be about information, after all he was to be the Pack’s Enforcer and it was his stock in trade. In the role of Enforcer, he would be the keeper of the dirtiest of secrets and deeds. It was a role Peter took as serious as a heartbeat – they all knew that.

Now Duke, however . . . getting Duke to drop something once he’d gotten scent of it was another matter altogether.

++++++

Laura’s mind was a muddle. She was worried about Peter and his recent disappearances, which seemed more often than not had something to do with the vampire.

“So where did he really go?”

She’d almost forgotten Erica was there and jolted with surprise at the question, almost slamming the locker door on her own fingers. Her friend leaned casually up against the adjacent locker, eyes keen.

“What do you mean?” Laura asked, busying herself with shoving the book she’d just snatched up into her bag for class.

Glancing around Erica moved in closer, whispering to her friend, “Come on Laura. I know you’re hiding something. Look, I’m not going to tell anyone but you’ve been a bit on edge the last few days. I thought it was about the thing in the supermarket, but that’s not it, is it?”

Laura considered Erica, conscious that of everyone in the pack this was the one wolf she could trust with anything. And right now, she could smell the anxiety on her friend; emotions that had not really gone away after the supermarket scene, and as much as she just wanted to unburden, she could never betray Peter’s confidences like that. She was already scared enough about what it could mean if her uncle was really messing around with the vampire. Just a word, just one, could have far-reaching and irreversible consequences. So she zipped her lips on what she knew and instead tossed her bag strap over a shoulder, walking away as Erica kept pace.

“I’ve just been wondering if the vamp was gonna squeal on us, you know? But Peter said he sorted it out. He said we are safe, but it’s still . . . I mean it’s dangerous to even try striking a deal with one of them. I just don’t want to get him in trouble because he tried to save us . . . to save me.” She kept her voice low so any supers in the nearby would not be able to gather much from the whispered conversation.

Erica’s gaze shifted right to left as she followed up, “And you’re both sure it’s safe?”

“Yeah. I mean, he’s had ample opportunity, and from what some of the other weres have said about him, he seems to stick to his word. Seems to be important to him that he honours his promises . . . although I don’t know that means much for our kind.” She huffed. “I just have to work on not being so on edge about it, you know?” She gave the girl a shaky smile, really relieved that Erica had bought the story, even while feeling a little guilty at the lie that wasn’t quite a lie.

Erica nodded as they slipped into their first class. “Ok.” Then she said more assuredly, “OK.”

This was what she loved about Erica. Erica was your die hard, got-your-back-in-a-brawl, to-the-end kinda friend. Sure, she’d get scared in a pinch if it was warranted, but she followed orders without question and trusted unless given reason not to. So the topic was dropped – for now.

++++++

It had been a week. A whole week and his skin was beginning to feel stretched too thin across his scrawny frame. No sight, no sound, nothing of the wolf and Stiles felt like he could cry.

He didn’t want to make a big deal because really, it was the smartest move to make – to simply stay away. But at the same time it felt so wrong, but maybe it was only on his end. Maybe he’d been wrong about what it had meant. He really didn’t want to be wrong, even though he kinda did because of the consequences.

But being wrong meant no further interactions with the wolf. Being wrong meant no trouble for his mother. Being wrong meant adherence to _The Directive_. Being wrong also meant no more Peter Hale, in any shape or form. And after the night he’d spent curled into the warmth of the wolf, somehow that was last bit was hardest to take.

He’d really expected some interaction. Had stayed up late each night, jittery and pacing, keeping a close eye on the back fence, but nothing. A whole week and nothing.

And everything in him just felt wrong.

++++++

She crawled over the centre console into his lap and tried to devour his face.

And Peter really wished he could feel something other than revulsion. Wished he could at least summon a woody for what it meant, at the very least. But when a growl erupted from his wolf who would not be contained a second more, Imogen squeaked and scrambled back against the dashboard.

He knew his eyes were glowing yellow and he was beginning to shift.

**_Fuck!_ **

Peter shoved open the driver’s side door, shoving her unceremoniously off his lap, and almost fell out on the forest floor in his attempt to put some distance between the wolf and the young woman. He doubled over, fighting, as he felt the shift beginning to take, his eyes glowing yellow while barely containing the roar that bubbled up his throat.

He felt Laura first, then Talia, in the back of his mind quickly being clouded by the wolf’s insistence at being heard. His pack bond ripped raw, rippled with his family’s concern; his pack was startled. He tried desperately to pull it back, to reassure but it’d been too long holding the wolf in check this past week.

“Peter?!” Imogen’s voice was soft and worried, and the wolf’s head swung toward her as it snarled.

Peter quickly slammed the car door shut, putting her out of the wolf’s view and scent, and briskly scrambled away, nearly on his hands and knees in the brush of leaves, dirt and other detritus.

His cell phone rang.

Laura calling.

“Where are you?” she said without delay. He could hear the force for calm in her voice

“Edge of the Preserve, nearest the convenient store.” She’d know the spot. It was a popular make-out point.

“We’ll be there in three. Hold on, Uncle Peter.”

He dropped the phone, fingers no longer even human, he buried his claws into the forest floor and inhaled deeply several times. When he felt like he could move again, he dragged himself to the nearest tree, about 20 metres away, turning and placing his back against the massive trunk to sit and wait for “back-up”.

“Peter?” he heard louder. Imogen’s voice, harsh but scared.

“Stay there,” he growled, wolf stirring once again, teeth sharpening in ire. “Don’t get out of that car!” he warned around the fangs as his wolf growled again. _“Oh for fuck’s sake. Calm down!”_ he scolded the wolf.

 _Fucking hell!_ It was his only thought before the wind blew Laura’s scent – the welcomed smell of pack to him. Then he heard his phone rang again, from where he’d dropped it on the ground. Talia’s signature Terminator theme song.

**_Double fuck!_ **

As his niece crouched to pluck the phone from the ground, she slid down beside him, one hand around the back of his neck, fingers clammy but reassuring. He was in no condition to have a conversation with his sister, never mind the Alpha right now.

_How the hell had an innocent park out/make-out session turn into a pack cluster-fuck anyway?_

++++++

“I’ve got him mom. Everything’s ok.” Laura told her mother and listened for a bit before responding, “Yea. I’ll get him home soon . . . No, he’s not in danger, I promise. There’s no need to come. I’ve got it under control.”

With a few more reassurances, she hung up, eyes once again on her uncle. Erica stood off to the side looking concerning between him and his vehicle, where she could clearly see Imogen peering at them, face contorted with anger and embarrassment.

“Erica, can you take her home, please” Laura asked their pack mate. Turning back to Peter she asked, “Keys in the ignition right?”

He only nodded, dropping his head between the palms of his hands and grabbing handfuls of hair. Laura glanced at Erica and the girl jerked her head in acknowledgement once before turning and doing as her future Alpha instructed.

“Take my bag with you. We’ll probably walk the rest of the way home through the Preserve. And Erica . . .?” When her friend met her eyes, she added, “don’t mention about the shift. Not yet.”

Again Erica nodded, stepping forward to quickly scent Peter, adding comfort to Laura’s own before hurrying toward his vehicle. When the car revved to life and they heard it pulling away, Laura finally sank down beside him, shoulders brushing to give her uncle and his wolf time for calm.

It was a while before either spoke.

“What happened?”

“I don’t even fucking know.” Peter groaned, head falling back against the tree trunk. “She wanted to talk, but didn’t want to go home.”

“And you brought her here?” Laura’s eyebrows rose. “To talk?”

Peter slanted an annoyed look at her.

“Hey, don’t blame me if you brought your ‘not girlfriend’ to the customary make-out spot to have a ‘ _conversation’_ ,” she drawled, using her fingers in exaggerated quotes.

And that only pissed Peter off more. He growled but didn’t see it coming when Laura smacked him across the nose like one would a misbehaving pet. His rumbling immediately stopped. They both sighed at the same time.

“Not one of your finer moments, Peter.”

“I haven’t lost control of my shift like that since I was five,” he moaned. He deliberately did not think about his wolf turning up at Stiles’ house to comfort the boy a week ago. A week ago when he’d similarly lost control of his shift to comfort the vampire.

A week spent trying not to think about _him_ ; of denying the wolf permission to shift, permission to seek him out like he wanted to. Peter had been keeping a stranglehold on his consciousness at all times, which meant restraining his wolf’s instincts and getting less sleep than he would normally allow himself. He shouldn’t be so surprised at his wolf’s revolt.

“You haven’t been sleeping lately,” she said softly, eyes on the distance and deliberately not looking at him.

He murmured a ‘hmmm’.

“Why? And don’t you dare tell me you’re concerned about pack security and trespassers. Use that line on the others. I’ve caught you too many times with the smell of vampire on you to believe it anymore.”

“That was twice. Only twice, Laura . . .”

“Plus,” she overrode him, “you refused to go running with the others two evenings ago. You always go to keep Duke in line . . .” her voice trailed off with a not-quite-question inflection.

“I just needed space, Laura. I feel like I’m about to walk out of my skin all the time and it’s getting worse. He’s never been this restless. He’s never responded like that to anyone who didn’t deserve it,” he argued, about his near attack of Imogen.

She hesitated to ask. She didn’t want to ask, but she had to. “Does it have anything to do with the Stilinski boy?” Goose pimples pricked her skin and a shiver ran down her spine. This time she did look at him.

Peter’s eyes flashed before he could contain it. The wolf rippling close to the surface.

“Thought so.” She didn’t wait for a verbal response.

She exhaled, an almost pained sound. “What do you want to tell mom? She’s going to ask.”

He grunted his displeasure at the thought. “I’ll think of something.”

“ _Peter_.” The warning in Laura’s tone was strong, as was the disapproval in her brows. She looked more like her mother in that moment than at any time before in Peter’s recollection.

“Yea.” He knew. He knew his excuse for the disruption in the pack bond had to be explained, and with something that did not involve the words, ‘lost control’ or ‘vampire’.

_He was so fucked._

++++++

Talia paced and glanced at her watch again. It had been two hours already and still no sign of Laura or Peter.

She’d sent a group text message after sending a burst of Alpha calm down the pack bond, to calm those who would have felt Peter’s alarm, although chances are only the older ones would have felt it, but it never hurt to add her own ‘voice’ per se to it. She’d then left soon after speaking with Laura to come home from the office. When she’d seen Peter’s car a bit of the tension had gone out of her shoulders, until she’d found out that Erica had driven the car home from the Preserve.

The Alpha had only got a small bit of the story from Erica, who truly didn’t know much other than something had happened between Peter and Imogen that caused Peter’s emotions to filter into the bond. Her brother usually had excellent control, but this was the second time this had happened in a matter of weeks and she couldn’t explain what was happening. A bit of guilt tickled the back of her mind.

She’d felt the tension in him this past week, especially, but she’d left it alone, since Duke had said he wasn’t sure if Peter was still seeing the girl, based on school gossip, and Peter wasn’t talking about it. In fact, Peter had said very little this past week and so she’d chalked it up to relationship stuff, which she could understand. But then today’s jolt was more than just a sexually frustrated wolf. For just a moment pain had rippled down the bond in a manner she hadn’t felt in years. Her eyes had flared red at the breach, at one of her family, her pack in pain, and she’d felt real fear thinking something had happened to her brother.

It was impressive that Laura had gotten there even before she could. She’d have to remember to commend her quick action. Her daughter was maturing beautifully and praise from the Alpha, even if the Alpha was her mother, could only help to boost Laura’s confidence in her decision making and quick action.

When another half hour passed with still no sight of the two, Talia tried calling Peter again, but the phone had been switched off. She’d tried Laura’s phone only to hear it pealing inside the house.  Erica must have brought it home with Laura’s things, after she’d dropped off Imogen Corfield. She briefly wondered if the girl was going to prove a problem for the pack in the future.

But all Talia could do was wait for her pack to show up. Her brother and daughter, and hope that whatever was happening with Peter was something they could fix.

++++++

Stiles was restless. Had been all afternoon, especially after the deep stares the Hale wolf had been directing his way all week.

He’d first noticed it three days ago. He’d been on the stairs outside the school where he’d stopped to chat with a few of his ‘subjects’ as his mother would call them, when the wolves had stalked by. He was still amazed they hadn’t created separate schools for them, but nope, BHH (Beacon Hills High) housed all species, just with a little more special arrangements for werewolves and vampires that were educated there.

They’d gotten used to giving way to each other in the interest of peace and keeping the skin on their hides. The last scuffle on school grounds had ended with both vampire and werewolf in question segregated. The two had bumped each other going through the hall doors, one not willing to give way to the other. The moment the wolf had shoved the vamp, the school had gone into complete silence. The guards at the door had gone literally pale and Stiles, who’d been among those to witness the scene had frozen in fear.

The quick thinking of one of the teachers had the two students quickly bustled into the principal’s office, away from the rest of the student population. It had been a nervous and quiet day at school filled with tension. Both vampires and werewolves had almost literally carved lines of movement around the school that day, staying as far as possible from each other. The Alpha and Lagan had been called in, along with other members of the local council. Everyone knew what that meant.

To this day no one talked about the “incident”, but the two students were not seen again at BHH, and their families were reportedly “relocated”. His mother had refused to answer Stiles’ questions about the outcome, admonishing him to never speak of it again.

But from that day there had been a healthy respect for distance between the two species in accordance with The Directive.

So when the wolf began eyeing him, he’d not known what to think of it. It was when Scott whispered, “Dude, she’s like scoping you out or something,” that Stiles really took note. But the wolf didn’t approach and neither did he. He just made sure to stay away, despite the fact that he burned to ask about Peter.

When her stares turned into worried glances, he really wanted to ask if Peter was ok. When she and Erica ran out of school, causing a near panic at the end of school, he’d felt a mad urge to follow. He couldn’t explain why the buzzing in his head convinced him it was about Peter. It had to be about Peter. _He wouldn’t feel this way otherwise, right?_ He so badly wanted to ask what was going on but commonsense won out.

It was crazy how much he missed the wolf.

++++++

Talia was on the steps the moment they emerged through the trees. She’d evidently changed out of her suit into jeans and a camisole. She looked more like sister and mother than Alpha in that moment and Peter was grateful for it. It helped to calm his wolf even more.

By the time they got on the path up the drive she was at the bottom of the stairs looking like she didn’t know if to run and hug him or what.

Laura ran a hand up his arm as they paused before her mother – scenting him as Talia did the same for Laura, curling a hand around her neck and pulling her into a brief hug.

“You did good,” Talia said softly. “Go grab something to eat. We’ll talk later.”

With one last slant at her uncle, Laura obeyed, disappearing into the house. It was then that Peter noted Talia was barefooted.

“Let’s take a walk,” she said, quiet as she slid one arm through his and turned him back toward the far edges of the grounds, a clear area where the family sometimes picnicked, with a large gazebo.

When they got to the clearing, Talia let go of his arm and entered the gazebo, Peter trailing seconds behind. Instead of venturing to the seating though, she squatted, folding her legs beneath her and sitting on the floor of the structure, her back against one of the posts and inviting Peter to do the same.

He sat close enough to feel his sister’s heat, their shoulders brushing, similar to what Laura had done in the Preserve.

“Did I do this?” was the first and most surprising thing she could have said to him.

Peter’s head snapped in her direction. “What?”

She glanced down at her hands, picking at a stress in the knee of her jeans. “I thought at first that it was a relationship thing – that you and Imogen were having issues, but the more I thought about it over the last few hours the more I realized that all of this started after our last conversation about your becoming Enforcer. You’ve been so tense this past week . . . if I’ve added to that, caused that . . .,” she swallowed heavily, “I’m so sorry, Peter.”

He didn’t know what to say. He’d been thinking up excuses for what had happened, but Talia was clearly giving him an out, and he’d gladly take it. _Thanks!_

“I . . .,” she paused, voice sorrowful. “I’ve only ever wanted what’s best for the pack and if this is too much responsibility too soon, we don’t have to think of it now. I know I’ve been hard on you, expected more of you, and if that’s in conflict with what your wolf wants, Peter you have to tell me. You’re in pain and I don’t know how to help, as your sister or your Alpha,” she sounded so much younger then.

“I’ve noticed, you know,” she continued, “that you’ve been trying to be more present for the pack. All the extra surveillance you’ve undertaken of the borders. How you’re always the last in at night; last to go to bed; how you wait up if Erica is out on one of her study sessions, or any of the others are on dates, and you haven’t been sleeping. It doesn’t have to be your job alone Peter. I’m Alpha for a reason. When I felt you in pain . . .” her eyes clouded, “when I felt your pain I thought we were losing you. I can’t lose you, Peter.”

He reached out and pulled his big sister into a hug. “You’re not losing me, sis.”

He held her for long moments. “Remember how mom used to say I was like a rash, always present when you least wanted it?” he smiled at the uptick of her mouth, “Well I’m here to stay. Not getting rid of me that easily.”

Peter felt a twinge of guilt. His sister was blaming herself for what inevitably was a reaction of denying himself interaction with a vampire, their sworn enemies. Damn!

When she pulled away, wiping wet eyes, he reached over to clasp one of her hands, linking their fingers like he hadn’t done since before his teenaged years. “Maybe I’ve been trying too hard to be the perfect example for the pack. But I don’t want you worrying about my taking on the role of Enforcer, I mean, let’s face it, I was born to play the role, and you know I’ll do anything to keep our pack safe. I maybe just need to let my wolf out a bit more. He’s been complaining but I guess I haven’t been listening.”

He squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry I worried you. Didn’t mean to. I tried to pull it back once I realized what was happening.”

“Erica said you were with Imogen, that she’s ok, but extremely pissed and a little scared,” Talia raised the Hale brows at him and he closed his eyes.

“Yea, she would be pissed,” he ignored the other part. “I’ll deal with it.”

“Remember your pack is here for you to lean on, Peter. You don’t have to do everything alone.”

He leaned over and kissed her on the temple. “Thanks, sis . . . Alpha.”

Her eyes flashed once and his responded in kind. “Let’s go eat.”

++++++

Peter stretched. The sun was warming his fur in a most delicious way. He grinned and licked his chops, feeling contented in a way he hadn’t in what felt like longer than the week it had been. His fuzzy brain came slowly online to feel fingers sliding through his ruff.

His wolf had taken over last night and he and Talia had gone running through the Preserve. She’d scented him and left him to his own devices before loping back to the house with an air of confidence only the Alpha possessed. He guess at some point he must have returned to the house and then fell asleep with members of the pack.

He was glad for the bonding with his sister.

He blinked open wolf eyes to see the vampire smiling at him. Peter startled and swore in his head just before Stiles muttered, “Morning, sleepy-head. I missed you!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave a comment if you liked it; if you want.


	5. Feuds and Family Expectations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Stiles just studied him as Peter put more space between them, dropping his hands reluctantly as a sudden breeze chased a chill up his spine, replacing the heat he’d moments before been pleased and eager to wrap himself in._
> 
> _“What did you want to meet about?” Stiles asked softly, already knowing the answer before he even asked the question._
> 
> _“I can’t do this, Stiles. We can’t do this, whatever this is.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rewrote this chapter too. I really don't have an update schedule, but I'll at least try to put something up every week. Thanks to those of you who've indicated you are enjoying it, that gives me incentive to write, especially since I haven't been well the last couple days. Thanks for keeping me buoyant!

Stiles had just slid his lunch bottle onto the table, was about to greet Scott, Isaac, Kira and Hayden when his phone buzzed.

**_Unknown number: We need to meet _ **

Stiles stared at the message, puzzled. He didn’t recognise the number.

**_Stiles: Who is dis?_ **

**_Unknown number: Peter_ **

**_Unknown number: We need to talk_ **

**_Unknown number: 5:30. preserve_ **

**_Unknown number: u know where_ **

Stiles sprang up from his seat.

“Stiles?” Scott voiced, puzzled. “Everything ok?”

“Uh, yeah, yeah. Just something I forgot . . .  to tell my mom. I’ll be right back.”

He hurried from the table, with his friends watching him depart curiously. He was still reeling a bit from the early morning scramble a day ago when Peter almost dislocated his hind leg trying to get out of Stiles’ bed, after the wolf woke up beside him. For that brief moment it was as if the wolf hadn’t known where he was.

This was the second time the wolf had turned up when he was feeling particularly down, but it was the first time Peter had been that insistent on leaving immediately. It was almost like he couldn’t get away from Stiles fast enough, and that hurt. All those feelings, that hadn’t been too far from his mind the day-and-a-half resurfaced again with these unexpected texts.

And now a request for a meeting.

**_Stiles: Is that safe?_ **

**_Unknown number: I’ll make sure it is._ **

**_Unknown number: Just be there._ **

Stiles paused, debating with himself the many reasons Peter could have for physically wanting to see him. Finally he responded:

**_Stiles: K, but ur freaking me out._ **

**_Stiles: Has sumting happened?_ **

**_Unknown number: Can’t talk now. Please just meet me._ **

His mind was rife with worry as he warily accepted the request. As much as he’d like to think that Peter was feeling the same kind of pining urges he was, Stiles was willing to accept that maybe he’d been wrong in thinking what he did about what they were to each other – after all, what did he really know about werewolves?

His hand shook because after the last mishap he’d tried to forget he’d given Peter his number two weeks before; had almost succeeded, although internally he’d been secretly hoping for Peter to want to talk to him; even a butt dial would have been a balm to Stiles’ bruised ego. But there’d been nothing, for almost two days since Peter showed up at his fence for a second time.

When he’d sleepily mumbled the number to the wolf that first time, he hadn’t been sure; there was no telling if . . . well, he hadn’t been sure the wolf even had any kind of mental recognition or processing power for that sort of thing, especially in that base form. He guess he knew now. It was another small fact to add to the accumulating ones about wolves, though there was still too much he didn’t know.

It had still been a bit of a shock, the wolf turning up at his fence two nights ago. He’d been in the coffee shop after school, Scott and Kira have dragged him out after school to try to get him to “kick this funk you’re in”. But while he’d been standing there, trying to relax and smile with Mrs. Holden, one of the town’s older vampires, he’d seen Peter’s very familiar car swing by and sitting in the passenger seat was a smiling Imogen Corfield. His stomach had dropped into his toes and he hadn’t realized what little colour had been in his cheeks leaked out leaving them almost translucent, until the elderly lady had touched his hand and asked if he was alright.

He’d tried then, however unsuccessfully to school his features into a blank mask while his insides twisted and turned – feeling somehow violated and extremely foolish. He could admit now it had been nothing but the sharp pain of jealousy flowing through his veins then. He’d worked himself into such a state about the two evidently having gotten back together that by the time Peter had turned up at his fence that night, Stiles had already spent most of it in tears.

The vampire still wasn’t sure what had prompted him to check, but he’d looked out and seen those yellow eyes looking back at him. When the wolf had whined in what sounded like worry, he’d briefly considered just leaving Peter out there. He deserved to suffer the way Stiles had, but somehow the vampire just couldn’t. He’d rushed out the back door after turning off the security and opening the gate; running right to the wolf and latching onto his neck. Then the wolf had tugged him back inside and he’d reset the security system and followed Peter’s acute nose back up to his room.

He’d cried on the wolf until his throat was dry, his eyes were itchy and he was exhausted. Peter, or at least his wolf, had whined and burrowed into him apologetically when he’d confessed that he’d seen him with the Corfield girl. Stiles had held on when he’d drained himself of all his worry and pain and allowed sleep to come.

Yesterday morning after Peter departed had been spent in long hours scrubbing and spraying with a special scent-neutralising cleaner that was usually used to remove the smell of spilled blood from supernatural premises. Vampires were very susceptible to the smell so the formula had been created to prevent the kind of blood haze that could spell trouble for their kind, and also to cover other supernatural mishaps, though it didn’t necessarily prevent forensic findings of blood spillage. He’d been satisfied with the results but very conscious of how risky the whole thing with Peter had been.

But then, Peter had all but ignored him again all day and he didn’t know what to think after the wolf’s hasty departure. Now Peter wanted to meet. In the preserve this evening, when Stiles had no idea where his mother was scheduled to be returning.

_It could be a trap._

But then, Peter had never shown any interest in the political line of things and on the other hand, if Peter’d wanted to kill him, he’d had more than enough opportunities to do so. Unless he’d been buttering him up for this.

 _Oh, stop it, Stiles!_ He chastised himself. But what else could this mean?

He was still lost in his head and staring down at his phone when someone called his name.

“Stiles?” Kira stood there, pale skin making her look more delicate than she really was. “Are you sure everything’s ok. Your eyes are red are red again.”

They’d done that two days ago in the coffee shop when neither of his friends could get him to say what was wrong. He’d just lied – although by then it was not a lie – about not feeling his best and wanting to go home. Scott had driven his jeep and parked it, letting Kira then take him home instead.

Now Stiles blinked the red orbs back to normal. “Skipped dinner and breakfast, so I’m a little parched,” he excused. At least that bit was the absolute truth. He’d had no appetite before or since the incident with Peter.

“Then come on. Let’s get you fed. What did you bring? Is it that cherry flavour again?”

“Yup, my favourite.” He licked his lips.

“It really is good,” Kira returned his grin. “Have you tried the new pomegranate? It’s to die for.”

++++++

Peter knew he needed to ditch Deucalion today. Trey was never an issue. Duke though, could be a genuine pain in the ass when he wanted to be and today was such a day. Peter had made him suspicious again the last two mornings by turning up late for breakfast. After the panic in the bond that afternoon, then his absence the following morning, and his tardiness this morning (he’d been feeling sluggish), all these were the kind of ill-advised actions that would only spark Duke’s interest and suspicion.

Now it was almost 5 p.m. and he was just pulling up to the house with everyone in the car. He had 30 minutes to make it back to the meet with Stiles. His blood sang in his veins at the thought and he tried not to dwell on it, to keep the pheromones under control.

They’d had to wait almost ten minutes at the high school for Erica, who’d been discussing a group study session with a were from another allied pack. Thank God there’d been no sight of Stiles or his signature ‘blue-mobile’.

“I’m gonna run over to Imogen’s, we have a few things to settle. Tell Talia I’ll call if I’ll be too late.” He caught Laura’s eyes in the rear-view and he saw her pause. Fear flashed briefly across her face before she reined it in. He knew she was suspicious about whether he was really telling the truth about his planned whereabouts.

“Thought you and Imogen were on the outs?” Duke said with a sly smile, eyes keen.

To Peter’s surprise, while Imogen had been pissed at him, she hadn’t ratted about his wolf’s freak out in the car. Such actions were extremely frowned upon by the local council – and while a similar action with a vampire on the receiving end would have dire consequences, with any other specie, human or not, it was simply frowned upon with a warning. He was curious as to why she’d held back on getting him into trouble. Imogen always had ulterior motives, but he deeply suspected Laura and Erica had done or said something to the girl. They could be fucking scary when needed, especially Laura. She was too much like her mother in that regard.

“Kinda why I’m going over there,” he muttered. What he didn’t say was that he knew regardless, his wolf would never accept Imogen, not now. The moment in the Preserve had proven that definitively and he knew if he tried, he could end up hurting the girl, physically and maybe even mortally. His wolf had given indisputable notice that he was done playing nice and it was up to Peter to listen.

“Ok, I need to pick some things up from the convenient store. You can drop me on the way.”

“Why didn’t you say something earlier? I could’ve stopped on the way in.”

“But you’re going back out now, so what’s the issue. Unless . . .,” Duke didn’t finish the thought.

“I can take you.” Laura rushed to offer. “Mom wants me to make a supermarket run anyhow, so I’ll take her car. She’s having people over tonight to talk about the elections. I can take you into town so Peter doesn’t have to divert.”

“It’s not that far out. Less than five minutes from Imogen’s place. Unless that’s NOT where you’re going.” Duke was still, nostrils subtly flared taking in all the scents for a hint of trickery. He was the one wolf with a nose like a blood-hound. It made him extremely valuable to the pack, but his hot head cancelled out his effectiveness on a hunt, making him also very dangerous.

Peter exhaled roughly. “It’s ok, Laura. I’ll drop him off; you can pick him up on your way in and let him help with the groceries.”

Their eyes met again and he saw she was annoyed. She no doubt suspected that this was not just about Imogen. He really needed to stop doing this to her. Today would be the last time. The absolute last . . . he hoped.

++++++

Peter’s mind was turning over how to use all this to his advantage. So instead of driving to the convenient store first, he drove to Imogen’s, hopped out and ran to the door. When she opened with a pretty pout, he leaned up against the door jam explaining lowly that he had to run an errand with Duke but he’d be back so they could talk.

Despite her peak, he could smell she was pleased at the attention, even if a little wary. He felt like crap for doing this, but he’d always known she was one of those humans wanting a way into the Hale pack. Peter was to be her meal ticket. Right now his wolf was less than pleased with the fact he was even touching her moments before he was set to meet up with Stiles.

“You didn’t have to leave. I could walk,” Duke offered, when he got back to the vehicle, somewhat sincere now he’d seen Peter look like he really had made plans with Imogen.

“I said I’d drop you and I will. Besides, if Laura gets there and you aren’t ready she’s gonna be mad the rest of the night. Imogen’s gonna be fine with this.”

“Look, I’m sorry, Peter. I didn’t mean to be an asshole earlier; it’s just that you’ve been so secretive lately. You used to tell me everything, man. I didn’t even know you and Imogen were getting serious.”

Peter was surprised at the conclusion Duke had drawn, but then again the wolf was right, Peter had been keeping more to himself than he’d been sharing recently. So to clear things up he added, “We’re not . . . getting serious. I mean, not really. She’s a cool girl and all, but I don’t want to get her hopes up you know?”

“What do you mean? Wait, is that what that’s about? Are you breaking up with her? Is it because of whatever happened between you two in the Preserve?”

“Well first, technically, we were never together,” he shrugged.

“Don’t be an ass. You know what I’m asking.”

Peter sighed. “Second, I’m about to become Talia’s Number Two, Duke. The Alpha’s Enforcer. Do you think that’s something Imogen’s going to understand? Sure she’s intrigued at the prospect of being something other than human; being a Hale, but is she ready for what being with me would mean? She throws a fit if she smudges her nail polish or scuffs a shoe. How’s she gonna handle blood? Or me covered in it when I have to solve pack problems and disputes?

“Besides, I don’t think she’s what I want, or what my wolf wants.” Two days ago made that supremely clear, he reminded himself. To Duke he added, “I need someone who’s not going to end up afraid or ashamed of what I have to be, and that’s a tall order for anyone to fill, supernatural or not.”

They’d come to a stop in front of the convenient store, but this was the crux of it. He’d always known what his place would be and while some might think him stand-offish or cold, Peter was very aware that Enforcer was a solitary life – always watching, always suspicious, calculating the odds. Chances are he’d end up with even less friends that the few he kept now.

“You know we don’t care right?” Duke tried to comfort. “I mean, sure she’s not perfect and everyone knows she wants in with the pack, but we don’t care that she’s human, Peter. I mean, you don’t want to be single the rest of your life, do you?”

No, he didn’t. But that didn’t mean he’d just pick anyone because he was lonely. A life-partner, a mate was serious business – even more so for the pack Enforcer because of the bloody and mostly solitary nature of what the role entailed. And while the pack would not care if he chose a human or someone of another supernatural species, they’d sure as hell care if that someone was a vampire . . . Besides, The Directives made it next to impossible for any kind of personal interaction between the species. In fact, such interactions were not allowed. _Those damned Directives._ The despairing thought burst from the back of his mind, and his wolf growled at the double standards – the fact that they could cavort as they pleased with any other species but when it came to vampires they could hardly hold a civil conversation for fear of things turning sour and the consequences of such.

“Look I’d better go.”

“Yeah, sure, ok. Go easy on her, will you?” Duke climbed out, but poked his head back into the window. “And Peter, if you just want to shoot the shit later, just call me. I’m sure Talia will understand us wanting to blow some steam. And sorry I gave you such a hard time earlier today, man.”

“It’s ok, bud. I’ll see ya later.”

Peter pulled away, glancing at the clock – 5:46. That little chat and diversion had taken longer than he liked. He hoped Stiles was still there . . . still safe.

++++++

Stiles glanced at his watch again, pacing back and forth, head popping up at every little sound. It was ten minutes before 6 o’clock and it was starting to get dark, especially here with the thick canopy.

_Where was Peter? Had something happened to him?_

The texts today had seemed so frantic and unlike the wolf he was getting to know. But Stiles hadn’t been able to reach him by phone this evening. Was Peter in trouble and not able to reach out to him perhaps? Unable to warn him? Maybe the authorities were on their way to detain Stiles. Breaking The Directive was nothing to slouch at and each time they were together they broke the first most valuable Rule of The Directive – that which prohibited “co-mingling”. Though the punishment was determined by the Local Council, they ranged from dismemberment to indefinite imprisonment and death.

There were no deviations to the three sanctions. There never were. And there were no exceptions.

**_None._ **

These thoughts and worries swirled through his mind as he alternately twisted his fingers, or shoved them into the pockets of his red hoodie.

So when he turned at a noise of brush being shoved ruthlessly aside and found Peter racing through the trees, nothing could stop him from rushing forward and throwing himself at the werewolf. Imogen forgotten. Jealousy tossed aside. Feelings of abandonment, abandoned. His brain didn’t even process it until the wolf caught him up in his arms that this too was forbidden. Until he felt Peter’s warmth. For a moment it all no longer mattered.

It was a shock to them both and they both froze before something in them both settled. Something Peter had been fooling himself that he could do without. Something Stiles had told himself he needed to do without. When Peter’s arms curling reflexively around him, Stiles dropped his head into the wolf’s chest and exhaled.

“I was so scared.” Stiles’ breath caught. “I thought something had happened to you. I couldn’t get through to your phone . . . I kept getting voicemail and I . . .”

“I turned it off,” Peter affirmed, apology ripe in his voice. “I couldn’t risk you calling  . . . I’m sorry . . .” Peter didn’t want to let go. He should, but couldn’t. His limbs refused to cooperate with the cautions of his mind – his two states of consciousness once more locked in a battle of wills that he somehow knew this time the wolf would win.

His wolf just wanted to curl up in Stiles’ scent and never leave, never let go. It was so overwhelming and so soon – maybe too soon after they’d met, and he shook with a release of tension he’d been holding in the past two days since he’d left Stiles’ bed. He found himself burying his face in Stile’s neck and just inhaling the scent he craved. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

 _This is wrong!_ His rational mind screamed and was summarily ignored as his wolf growled at the unwelcome thoughts.

Stiles lifted his head and those eyes. It was those emotive whiskey-coloured eyes that did it. When Peter’s lips touched his, Stiles melted.

“Peter,” he breathed, and the werewolf delved in, tongue exploring as a moan escaped.

Both wolf and man were now officially damned.

++++++

“Stiles,” Peter growled, plundering the soft, sweet mouth beneath his; his wolf wanting to cloak itself in these feelings, wanting to delve deeper into this taste and bound around the grounds in its own excitement.

When they finally came up for air, Peter was so damn conflicted. “We have to stop.”

“What?” The vampire let out a little sound that was a cross between a whine and a moan and simply curled Peter’s toes and set his wolf wagging again in delight. “Why? I like it.”

It was Peter’s turn to protest as Stiles’ words set his blood afire. “I can’t, Stiles,” and he began to pull away, his skin feeling like it was on fire.

Stiles just studied him as Peter put more space between them, dropping his hands reluctantly as a sudden breeze chased a chill up his spine, replacing the heat he’d moments before been pleased and eager to wrap himself in.

“What did you want to meet about?” Stiles asked softly, already knowing the answer before he even asked the question.

“I can’t do this, Stiles. We can’t do this, whatever this is.”

“I think we both know what this is. I know you feel it too. You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t. We wouldn’t have just done . . . _that_ . . . if you didn’t.”

“It’s against the law. Against everything our families stand for. You know what the punishment for this is . . .”

“What if it’s time to change the rules?” the vampire asked baldly causing Peter’s heart to trip.

“Don’t . . . don’t say something like that . . . even the thought is forbidden!” Peter’s heart continued to thump.

“But you know I’m right, Peter.”

“ ** _Nothing about this is right!_** ” Peter’s growled, voice harsh, strained. _Why couldn’t Stiles understand that they’d passed the point of flirting with danger now? Well pass it!_

“Who determines what’s right and wrong about our interaction? Why does a council get to decide who lives and who dies for nothing more than interacting with each other; attempting to interact. Aren’t you tired of having to walk on a certain side of the street; of the aisles in the supermarket; classrooms at the uni; and no one ever explaining what’s just so got damn bad about us associating with each other? **_Nobody questions this._** **_Why is this such a bad thing?_** ” Stiles hissed, furious and frustrated.

“Why is this . . .” Peter gasped, trailing off uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was taking, well into even more forbidden territory. “Don’t you remember the murders; the raids? Less than 12 years ago when the last rebellion tried to challenge the Directive, don’t you remember how they stomped out any attempts to _associate_? Even questions about The Directive were stamped out! And we were still fighting each other in the streets then . . . Don’t you remember how they made examples of all of them that rose up? Even those that tried to save the ones who were rebelling . . . How my mother was slaughtered . . . and, your father . . . when neither of them could re-institute the peace?

“The hunters would have killed us all if it hadn’t been for the council. This peace we now have is hardly any peace at all the way out species still barely hold off attacking each other. The Directive is all that has stopped us descending into chaos over the past decade; from being wiped out by those who enforce “ **the peace** ”. The consequences of us even touching each other, like this, here, now . . .” His skin pimpled with fear. “I can’t do this to my family . . . and you can’t afford to.” Yellow eyes lifted pleading to the vampire to understand. “Besides, you know what I am. What I’ve been trained to become. Better than most, _you know . ._. If a war breaks out between vampires and werewolves again, it will be my job to hunt your kind. Can you honestly say it doesn’t scare you? The possibility of what could happen between our species?”

Stiles exhaled shakily. “I’m not afraid of you, Peter. Not anymore, and the Directive cannot decide for me what I know in my heart.”

“Then you’re a fool,” he turned away, shame crawling up his spine before anger replaced it. “Not so long ago you were thinking I was going to eat you, remember? That I was going to rip your delicate, porcelain skin from your body. The Directive you’re railing against is all that prevents those atrocities happening all over again, and if we do this it will rip everything apart; everyone we love.”

“I don’t believe that.” Then Stiles’ voice went soft as he stepped forward to lay a hand on Peter’s chest. “And neither do you . . . Everyone just goes along with the Directive ‘ _for the greater good_ ’, but what’s so good about any of this?” Stiles’ gaze held his. “What if . . . what if your soulmate isn’t your race? What if he’s something you’ve been taught to hate and distrust your whole life, because of a feud that no one remembers how it started and rules handed down that tell us the only way we can coexist is separately.”

Goose pimples prickled Peter’s skin again. “You don’t know that . . . we don’t know that this is . . .”

“ ** _Stop_** . . . please, just stop.” Stiles’ voice broke as he sobbed, “ ** _You know_**. You knew the moment you sniffed me in the supermarket. Just as I knew the moment I heard your heartbeat, _really_ heard it.”

Peter closed his eyes; heart beating a panicked rhythm beneath his rib cage. He hadn’t wanted to know. He’d been denying it, denying his wolf what it wanted, what it’d been saying to him for days now; what he’d known the moment he woke up in Stiles’ bed that first time with the boy holding him tight – confirmed with Imogen when he lost control of his wolf again.

But none of it was that easy. It could never be that easy. He had too many demons; too much lay on his shoulders. “I’m not a good man Stiles. I can’t be; and I haven’t exactly been sitting around waiting for my mate to show up since I turned a teenager. I never expected any of this.” His voice was hushed in confession.

The vampire was silent for a few moments. “I know.” He paused again. “I’ve also seen you with **_her_** yesterday. Is that why you’ve been avoiding me? Is she what you want? What you both want?”

Peter’s heart beat a quick tattoo and his wolf snapped at him internally, angry at the scent of hurt and discomfort that was emanating from Stiles. Peter sighed, closing eyes tight as he shakily tried to settle both wolf and vampire. “No!”

He opened his eyes to look at Stiles. “She’s not. How could she?” He let the question trail off for a moment. “And my wolf . . . my wolf won’t allow it now and for the first time I don’t feel like fighting with him about it. Just the mere thought of being around anyone else like that makes me queasy.”

He paused to shake his head in despair, using his hand to cup Stiles’ pale cheek. “They’ll kill us if they find out; **_when_** , when they find out, you know this.”

Stiles, who’d been nodding along, swallowed audibly. “Yeah, I know.”

“My wolf isn’t thrilled with that scenario either.” He stepped closer, unable to help himself as he ran a thumb along Stiles’ cheek, their chests almost touching. The vampires’ face under his warm figures was smooth and no longer as cold to the touch.

Stiles snorted. “I don’t blame him, your wolf . . . I’m not entirely comfortable with the idea either. So we’ll need a plan, and we’ll need to be careful. But I’m not giving you up, not now that I’ve found you.”

Peter pressed their foreheads together as his wolf rippled contentedly and visibly beneath his skin, causing a shocking little thrill to roll through Stiles’ body. “My wolf will need to prepare us both for this . . . And I, I need to talk to Imogen.”

Stiles’ scent went ripe with discontent and Peter’s wolf growled. _This would not do, not at all._

Peter tilted Stiles’ face up with a single finger. “Look at me.”

When Stiles’ brown eyes met his blues, he saw the pain there and knew he couldn’t leave his mate like this. His wolf would never allow it. “I need to talk to her, Stiles. I need to end it. I can’t do this and _that_ , despite the fact that _this_ could get us both killed. We’ll figure something out, but this I have to do. Please understand. My wolf won’t settle until you do.”

Stiles squeezed his eyes tight and tried to find his strength. They’d already broken the first most sacred rule and Peter was willing to break even more to be with him, conscious of what it could mean for his Pack. Stiles knew the Enforcer of a werewolf pack was loyal, first and foremost to his Alpha and pack. Peter was disregarding his Pack, his family, his heritage to be with Stiles. All he was asking for was that Stiles allow him to meet one last time to break off his . . . whatever . . . with a girl he’d been seeing for the last couple month after he’d returned home to Beacon Hills.

As he opened his eyes he was already nodding to Peter. “Ok . . . Ok. Can I see you tomorrow?”

“Yes. We’ll find a way. I have to go now, but I’ll call you later, ok?”

Despite his anxiety and rush now to be rid of Imogen once and for all, Peter refused to rush his goodbye to Stiles. He pressed a soft kiss to the vampire’s pink lips and revelled as Stiles opened like a flower beneath his seeking tongue.

“Go,” Stiles whispered when they finally separated.

Peter’s eyes met his and he brushed a quick finger again across Stiles’ cheeks before he turned away. He had so much to think about. He wasn’t yet willing to think about Talia and how he’d just finished bonding with his sister, and less than a day later was embracing their enemy. He refused to think about how this would damage his pack. All he could feel, all he could think right now was Stiles belonged to them – he and his wolf and he couldn’t afford anything to happen to him.

. . . but Imogen first – and he wasn’t looking forward to that discussion.


	6. The Path of Most Resistance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“And you?” Stiles asked, softly, eyes averted as he chewed on his lips with the nerves of wanting to know, but dreading the answer. “Is this what you want, Peter?”_
> 
> _“I want to not hurt my family, Stiles . . . but I don’t want to give you up either. I can’t.”_
> 
> _There it was, that warmth again. Stiles barely held back the urge to flash his eyes and beam in happiness. “Ok, well that’s a good starting point at least,” he said instead._
> 
> _Peter shook his head. They were well past the starting point and truly on a path that could led to both their deaths if they were not careful._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I missed an update last weekend because it’s heading into the last week of carnival here. I’m actually putting this up today because it’s a holiday so I actually got time to edit it, but I can’t say the next update will be before next week. Did I say it’s carnival, people?!!! CARNIVAL!!!

Stiles floated home after his tryst with the werewolf on a cloud. He secured the house, dropped his clothes in the machine with extra scent pods to purge Peter’s scent from the garments, and fell into bed with a warm smile on his face. He could still taste Peter, still feel his arms around him like two warm, heavy bands of safety and near preened with the memory.

He giggled before he realised the sound was coming out and snuggled down to prepared to let sleep take over. He knew he’d dream of Peter that night and welcomed the fuzzy feelings inspired by that thought. He just hoped the wolf was thinking of him too.

++++++

Peter ducked as another ornament crashed into the wall near his head and was particularly grateful just then that she was only human. He saw a head bob just beyond the partition and was momentarily surprised that Imogen’s parents hadn’t come further to investigate what was clearly a fight – at the very least a throwing of items – in their living room, even if their daughter was the only one throwing objects.

“Oh yeah!? Shauna saw Duke at the supermarket with your **_sister_** _an hour ago_ , **_without you_** , you liar. You string me along for months, **_months_** . . . and come back here, nearly two hours after you were supposed to be ‘running an errand’ with your pack mate, to break up with me?” she shrieked before another object slammed into his arm this time.

“Where were you? I promise this isn’t ending here, Peter. I demand satisfaction, and even if I have to go to your Alpha to get it, I will have it!” her face contorted most unattractively in a sneer of satisfaction, believing her threat would bring the wayward beta to heel when Peter scowled. She’d get what she was after, one way or the other tonight.

But the growl that erupted from Peter as his eyes flashed a vibrant yellow was the last thing she expected and she recoiled sharply at the blatant anger written in every line of his countenance, remembering the incident just a few days before in Peter’s car. She’d known just how dangerous he was then, but had mistakenly considered the fact that he’d cast himself away from her rather than cause her harm, to be an indication that he couldn’t and wouldn’t hurt her.

His anger though, this raw burning anger, was something she’d not seen before.

“You think you can force me to stay with you by threatening to report me to my Alpha,” he hissed around sharpening canines. “That Talia would force me to be with _you_ ,” he snarled the word like it was derogatory, “someone who would try to blackmail a werewolf into being with her, staying with her? You really think that’s a smart move to make?”

The force of his anger was near palpable as his wolf came to the surface, incensed at her unmitigated gall, and his prowl caused her to take several steps back.

“I . . . I . . .”’

“I came to here to let you down easy, to explain my position as clearly and painlessly as I could; to make this as smooth a break as I could, but you won’t let this go, so let me be frank. My wolf **_does . not_** **.** **want . _you_** ; **_won’t_** **.** **accept . you** and if I continue with this he’s likely to take that as a sign of disrespect on both our parts and trust me, you don’t disrespect a wolf without repercussions.

“So we’re done here,” he snarled, as her mother’s startled face appeared on the threshold of the living room this time. But the wolf had no time with any of them. He was done. They both were. “Remember next time that werewolves don’t like to be threatened; you may not like the consequences.”

Her mother’s face contorted with alarm, eyes darting to her daughter and Peter could smell her rank fear and concern, whether directed at him or her daughter he didn’t know and no longer cared. If they filed a complaint to Talia, he’d deal with it then. He snagged his jacket from where he’d thrown it earlier when the fight started and stalked from the house, hearing her mother rush forward asking Imogen what she’d done as the door slammed behind him.

He sat in the car for a long while, watching the swaying of the curtains as family members peeked out, trying to remain inconspicuous and failing as Peter sat straining to rein in his wolf. They were both unsettled. His wolf wanted to return and tear her throat out for thinking she could take such a line with him. _Who the fuck did she think she was? Who did she think she was dealing with?_ Now he knew he’d made the right decision. Even if there was no Stiles in the picture, Imogen was definitely not the one for him.

He started the car and drove to the nearest club that served the supernatural crowd. He needed to get drunk, but more than that, he needed something to diffuse the scent of vampire from his clothing and person before he went back to his pack. Imogen wouldn’t have been able to tell where he’d been but his pack sure as hell would. To them, vampire was a scent he could never explain. He could have lied and said he went to the club where vampires always congregated, but everyone knew that even if the club served all species, there were separate entrances and the vamps and werewolves tended to party on opposite ends of the dancefloor. There were enough humans and other species to fill the self-imposed spaces between the two groups. Plus, vamps tended to go to clubs where werewolves were unlikely to be present.

Tonight he was sure he could lose the scent on one of the other species and clear his mind of a certain very tantalising vampire who, right now was at the centre of all his thoughts. His wolf sniffed to make his own objections known about the fact that they were about to cover themselves in the scent of someone who was not theirs.

Objection noted, Peter sighed and accelerated towards the opposite side of town.

++++++

The next three weeks flew by in a haze of forbidden meetings; hidden and hastily deleted text messages and even sweeter kisses. But as much as each meeting left Stiles in bliss, they left Peter with growing unease that they’d be found out and made examples of. He shuddered when he thought about the punishment The Directive dictated for such infractions as they were committing.

_ RULE NO.1 _

  1. _Co-mingling of the vampire and werewolf species is strictly prohibited – this includes but is not limited to intimate, casual and other unsanctioned activities. The punishment, depending on the nature of the action, shall include death, dismemberment or an indefinite term of imprisonment. There shall be no deviations from these sanctions._



At home Peter continued to dodge his sister, the concerned looks from his niece, the worry of his best friends and pack mates who thought his increasing need for solitude was as a result of the fallout from the now, very public breakup with Imogen. But it allowed Peter the time he needed to sneak away to see Stiles as the two mates got to know each other better.

For Stiles, it didn’t hurt either that the promised dinner with the Martins and Whittmores had to be postponed when Stiles’ mom had to go out of town on _official_ Lagan business. She was gone for little more than a week and returned to locked-door, private meetings and whispers about the elections. It sometimes meant that she slept at the house in town rather than at home with Stiles.

So a particularly frisky wolf was becoming an even more familiar feature at the Stilinski residence at the edge of the Preserve.

++++++

“How often do you need to feed and do you need real food, blood or can that synthetic thing work?”

Stiles smiled at Peter’s curiosity and tossed a piece of dried stick into the distance, from his position with his back against the large tree. Peter was pacing, keeping an ear out into the wider Preserve, conscious that they needed to scramble to safety at the slightest hint that his pack was roaming the area.

They’d been trading details about their lives that sometimes shocked them both at how misguided each specie was about what made the other tick.

So Stiles explained how synthetics worked and what he liked and hated about the various kinds. He explained about vampire healing and the connection of that ability to feeding. He explained about blood fugues and how vampires could get trapped in them if denied any kind of blood sustenance for a period of time.

And when Peter stood frozen before ducking his head in shame, Stiles’ voice gentled a bit. He knew the werewolf was no doubt remembering the prank they’d pulled on Greenberg at university. The prank had got him suspended for only two weeks, and that was because the chancellor was an old school friend of Talia’s and they’d been able to invite representatives of both the Lagan coven and the Alpha’s pack and make restitution, rather than invoke The Directive. Where possible they tried to make the Directive a last resort if other alternatives could be quietly found, without the involvement of the local Council that consisted primarily of hunters.

“I’m sorry. I . . . I didn’t know,” he apologised, closing his eyes as he finally understood the consequences of what could have happened to Greenberg.

“Just . . . don’t do it again. It’s not a good feeling, trust me. And a vampire that hasn’t fed in a while, who goes into a fugue, has to fight that thirst for a long time, even after he’s back on track. It’s like an alcoholic fighting the pull of a drink.”

“You talk about it like . . .” Peter trailed off as he studied Stiles – really studied him.

“Yeah.” Stiles shook off a shiver. “Someday I’ll tell you about what happened when I was seven and almost invoked The Directive. But not today. I think we’ve had enough talk of The Directive for today.”

Peter stalked over and pulled the vampire up to him, cradling Stiles against his chest – just to hold him. His thoughts were circling on that still undescribed incident where Stiles had gone into a similar mad rage like Greenberg had done. He shuddered thinking what or who could have caused it and wanting to protect that young Stiles from his past. Instead, he just held him, as the trees of the Preserve rustled around them. He knew then, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that apart from being his mate, he, Peter Hale, soon-to-be Enforcer for the Hale werewolf pack, was truly falling for Stiles Stilinski, vampire heir.

++++++

“How does the wolf thing work anyway?” Stiles asked at another secret tryst, turning on his head to look at Peter who was propped up above him on one arm. It was late, almost 10 p.m. and Peter would have to leave soon or run the risk of having his pack come searching, and that would be bad.

But for now, his nose was running an impressive line up Stiles’ neck, his wolf enjoying the contented sounds and smells from their mate. “Is it always like a separate you and him, it? Am I even allowed to say it? It feels disrespectful somehow to say it,” Stiles asked, brow puckered.

Peter pulled back briefly as he recalled the many times he’d thought of vampires only as things. “Him or he. He prefers the masculine pronoun; especially enjoys when _you_ say it.”

When Stiles smiled his beauty made Peter blink and his wolf preened at their gorgeous mate.

“Really?” Stiles felt a warmth he’d seldom felt before, but his curiosity was peaked now so he struggled a little to focus. “You talk like you’re two separate entities. Do you realise that?”

“Well, he kinda is. I know he’s there. He can sense me and me him and we share thoughts if one or the other wills it, but it’s kinda like having a split personality sometimes. He has his own thoughts and feelings about things that don’t always mesh with mine.”

“Who’s stronger?” The thought just popped into his head.

Peter thought about it for a second, running a finger down Stiles’ chest just to watch a blush rise in his cheeks. It was happening more frequently, the more time they spent together. “I suppose it depends. We’re both strong in separate ways. He’s more demanding and I tend to be more stubborn. If he feels strongly enough about something he can try to impose his will over mine, but it doesn’t really happen often. We usually find ways to coexist and compromise even when we disagree.”

“It’s just so strange,” Stiles paused as Peter pressed a soft kiss to his lips and pulled back. “For vampires it’s not like that at all. We’re one thing – a vampire, like all the time, every time. Sure we control the thirst; control our hearing; our smell isn’t as good as werewolves, but we’re always just one person. Like, I’m not human and vampire, I’m just one thing.”

Peter turned his head with a finger. “I think that’s where you’re wrong. You’re not just vampire, Stiles. You’re so much more than just vampire. Everyone runs when they see us werewolves coming. In one week of us meeting we had two arguments, and both of them were about the rules of The Directive and since then we’ve broken so many of them it panics me to think about it sometimes . . . _Just vampires_ don’t do that.”

“What about you? You’re different too. You saved my life, and then showed up at my house when I was having a bad night.”

“My wolf did that – both times.”

“You mean, you didn’t know.”

“First time yes. . .  Second time no, not until I woke up next morning.”

“Shit. I’m surprise you didn’t shred me in my sleep. Why didn’t you say something?”

“Say what, Stiles? I still have no idea how the fuck I got all the way across the preserve and into your bed without a conscious thought of what my wolf was up to. I should have been home in bed. That’s **_never_** happened before. I mean sure, we disagree, but he’s never blatantly locked me out before and done his own thing. I don’t know of anyone it’s ever happened to, and it’s dangerous for him to do things like that if I have no awareness of it . . . He wanted you and refused to let anything stand in his way . . . not even me.” He thought briefly as well about the incident with Imogen when he had to fight his wolf for control.

“And you?” Stiles asked, softly, eyes averted as he chewed on his lips with the nerves of wanting to know, but dreading the answer. “Is this what you want, Peter?”

“I want to not hurt my family, Stiles . . . but I don’t want to give you up either. I can’t.”

There it was, that warmth again. Stiles barely held back the urge to flash his eyes and beam in happiness. “Ok, well that’s a good starting point at least,” he said instead.

Peter shook his head. They were well past the starting point and truly on a path that could led to both their deaths if they were not careful.

“I need to go and you need to clean up before your mother gets home. Come on, let me out.” Peter kissed his cheek and rose, pulling Stiles similarly to his feet.

Stiles watched from the back door until Peter disappeared into the trees before turning back on the back lights. He’d gotten into the habit of darkening them at night in case Peter dropped by, so the human neighbours could see very little. His own enhanced vision was all he needed at night.  

He reached up to touch his lips, smiling at the lingering warmth and taste that Peter had left behind.

++++++

Stiles stretched as the sun glancing through his bedroom window warmed him.

 ** _Peter_** , his mind whispered and warmth further suffused his pale body making him smile smugly, especially when his phone was flashing to show he had a message. He’d bet it was from Peter.

He practically glided through his shower before forcing himself to calm down enough to pick up his phone to check his messages. He felt a momentary damper that it was from Scott.

**_Scott: hey bud, you disappeared ystrdy b4 I cud suggst getting 2gethr_ **

**_Scott: wher’d u go nyway. Pick me up for skool, ok. Bike down agin_ **

**_Stiles: sure_ **

He had no more messages.

He rushed down to breakfast to find his mother sitting at the table. That in itself was unusual and he was suddenly grateful that Peter had insisted he clean up last night.

“Hey mom,” he bussed a hesitant kiss to her cheek wondering when exactly she’d come home. “I thought you were spending the week in town? Is everything ok?”

She was looking at him strangely and he began to wonder if perhaps someone had spotted Peter the night before and reported it, or maybe he hadn’t got all the smell out

“Yeah, I wanted to talk,” she said slowly. “Are you feeling ok?”

“Yea . . .?”

“It’s just you’re a little warm sweetheart,” she said softly, getting up to touch his skin again after the brief kiss, “and flushed.”

“Must be the shower. Not like I can catch a fever after all,” he joked.

His mother hmmmed, frowning.

“What did you want to talk about?” he tried to divert her attention.

“The Martin/Whittmore dinner. I’ve been able to reschedule to tonight, at the mansion in town.”

Stiles turned away toward the refrigerator and concentrated on getting a glass of supplement for the morning. While there were suppliers of fresh animal blood in every major city and town where there were larger vampire populations, there were also the flavoured substitutes he’d told Peter about. Although the substitutes were not as filling as actual blood, they at least quenched the thirst. The market simply could not keep up the fresh supply in enough quantity or quality for the vampire population.

“Stiles?”

“I heard you, mom. I’ll be there.”

She approached him haltingly; his back still to her but his face was blank of all emotion. “Honey, I’m just trying to prepare you for . . .”

“Yes, yes, I know,” he swivelled away when her hand was moments from touching him, to place the bottle back into the carefully regulated refrigerator. “I’ll be on my best behaviour. I need to grab my stuff and pick up Scott for school,” he muttered, leaving the kitchen after pressing in the timer on the microwave.

“Your meal . . .” she called, pained yet relieved that the earlier unusual colour had drained from his cheeks leaving them the usual vampire-pale.

“I’ll grab it on the way out,” he said, as that tight feeling returned to the pit of his stomach. If he could give up his legacy to become the next leader of the vampires he would. He took no pleasure in the role he was expected to assume once his mother stepped down.

++++++

Claudia rubbed a hand across her brow, inhaling and exhaling slowly as she watched her son’s stiff, departing back.

 _When had they drifted so far apart that she no longer recognised her own son?_ From one day to the next it was like she didn’t know what to say to him anymore. Everything these days either ended in an argument, a stalemate, or Stiles simply wanting to be somewhere else other than in her presence. She took no joy in forcing him to take a more active role in their society. She’d love to coddle him, he was her only son, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t afford the weakness that would represent.

If he was to take her place as Lagan eventually, he’d have to know how to handle all kinds of personalities within the community, especially the super wealthy ones like the Whittmores and Martins. And she still hadn’t told him that one other family would be joining them. She knew she was procrastinating, putting off the ultimate blow-out until later. It was actually the second reason she’d come home rather than call. But then at the last minute she’d chickened out because she did not want to respond to the inevitable question of why they were having more guests – and these ones in particular.

She couldn’t help feeling like she was losing him and she feared her newest decisions for Stiles’ future would do just that. She didn’t know what else to do because the step she was about to take on the family’s behalf, what she was about to commit her son to could either result in his finally taking his place as heir or result in her losing him altogether.

As Lagan it was her responsibility to look after the safety and longevity of the community and ensure that those damned wolves didn’t overstep their place. As Mayor, she had a responsibility to all of Beacon Hills to ensure the peace held. Failure in that did not bear thinking about. She just wished Stiles could understand that everything she did was keep him safe.

She sighed as he glided back in, popped the “meal” from the microwave and mumbled a goodbye – no hug, no kisses, and merely a side glance before he was gone; the engine of the vehicle rumbling to life before the sound disappeared into the distance. She wished he’d let her replace the damn death trap but it was Stiles’ attempt to hold onto the memory of Damian, his late father, by keeping the vehicle running.

That thought only brought more guilt and she closed her mind against thoughts of it.

Her phone on the breakfast counter buzzed. The lit screen told her the Sheriff was calling. She took a breath and answered, “Hello, Sheriff.”

“Claudia,” the deep voice said on the other end. He still refused to call her anything but, at least in private. “Is everything ok?”

She was silent a moment, trying not to react to the rumble of his tone. That tone that always did things to her she dared not think about.

He continued. “I saw Stiles racing down the street a few moments ago.”

“Everything’s fine, _Sheriff_. Do you have official business to discuss? If not, I really have to be going.”

She listened as John exhaled heavily. “I just wanted to make sure he’s ok.”

“ _My son_ and how he’s doing is none of your concern. Goodbye, Sheriff Argent.”

She stood for a long while after just staring at the blank phone screen, trying to centre herself and keep the memories at bay and allow her hand to stop shaking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, took a bit of time to show the illicit meetings between our couple but I’m not sure how to deal with revealing the Directives as I go along. Would you guys prefer that I drop in the rules as we go (as I did here), or just do some kind of in-between chapter where I simply post the rules? Your feedback is much craved on this. Thanks as usual for reading and leave your comments.


	7. The Inevitable

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Sheriff crouched low and watched in despair. His heart sinking to the soles of his boots at the reality of what he was seeing. 
> 
> _No! No, no, no! It couldn’t be._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Work has got so damn busy lately, I'm finding little time to concentrate enough to write. I had to post this today though as a bit of therapy for the physical pain I'm in currently. Hope you enjoy this delayed update.

Stiles glanced over his shoulder. Sure his hearing did not indicate anything was awry, but he was in the preserve where he shouldn’t be and without Peter this time, so caution was the watchword here.

After another 15 minutes of searching, he slung the backpack from over his shoulders and zipped it open. He was starting to feel frustrated at his lack of success on these many runs. He wondered if it was time to tell Peter why he’d really been in the Preserve the day he’d found him. He’d been delaying, he could admit as much now. Each time Peter had asked he’d find some way to divert his attention. And let’s face it, even if the wolf was more curious than expected, Stiles knew his smell and the way he smiled at Peter could get the wolf to go from curious to horny in seconds flat. He’d proved it time and again.

But he wasn’t fooled into thinking that Peter was unaware of what he was doing. His mate was too intelligent for that. So he’d asked him to be patient. He’d badly wanted to find some evidence before he presented his reasoning and suspicions to Peter.

As Stiles withdrew the map and spread it out before him, sighing at the many X’s he’d already marked of the places he’d checked. His black marker in hand, he added another in the quadrant he’d sectioned off for today’s search.

But maybe, just maybe Peter would know if he asked. But would Peter even let him near the Nemeton even if he did know where it was. He knew if any of the supernatural community knew where to find it, it’d be the Hales who were its reputed protectors.

Glancing at his watch, he realised how late it had gotten. He needed to get home soon. He had two assignments due tomorrow and Peter said he’d stop by later. Added to this, the Hales usually did their perimeter checks late in the evenings. He took out the spray bottle from his bag and spritz a few times into the air, as he’d done on all his searches since Peter remarked about picking up his smell during the wendigo incident.

Satisfied, he set a brisk pace for home, spritzing every couple metres, just to be on the safe side.

++++++

Peter couldn’t settle.

He’d taken to visiting any number of less reputable establishments around the town anytime he met with Stiles. It was a better alternative to using Laura as his ally, although she’d turned up on at least two occasions, worry set deep into her forehead. But the more he thought about what they were actually doing, the more he came to the realisation that while he could suffer the consequences of his own actions, he would not allow his niece, his pack heir to be associated with any of this anymore.

So he became a regular feature at the clubs and even the “illegal” underground fight rings, just across the border of Beacon Hills. Last night after he left Stiles, he’d managed to get into a stinking, sweaty mess at one such fight against an ogre. He’d barely managed to get through that one, because he was sure Stiles was a little more distracted than normal. His twitching more suspicious than it usually was.

He’d left the vampire wondering but still not directly asking what was wrong. He’d been scared that Stiles would admit to second guessing their liaisons. So he’d poured his worry into his scrabble with the ogre – a fight that caused the few members of his pack that were still awake and encountered him when he’d crept home near dawn to wrinkle their noses in distaste. Talia had looked at his torn and bloody clothing like she thought he’d lost his mind. He was sure she wanted to ask again if he was ok, especially now that everyone knew about his break up. Instead, she’d taken one whiff and sent him off to the shower and to “put those damn clothes into the garbage”. Her eyes, though, promised the conversation wasn’t over.

But he’d been happy for her annoyance. It meant his secret was still safe – that Stiles, was still safe.

His leg jiggled again, and Trey frowned at him now. The entire campus was still whispering about his and Imogen’s epic break-up which the woman had somehow managed to spin in her favour, boasting that it was she who’d dumped the handsome Hale. She stopped short of implying he’d been unfaithful and he figured it was only because that meant she’d be painted as unable to fulfil a werewolf’s desires – not a good look if she still had dreams of joining a prominent supernatural pack.

But it didn’t matter, enough girls had given him coy eyes over the past few weeks to let him know they were more than willing to “step in”, should he need a “shoulder to cry on”. Imogen on the other hand had been glaring daggers at him and anyone who came close to him, while declaring to any who would listen that she didn’t care who he fucked.

“She’d burn you in effigy if she could,” Duke said, dropping into the vacant seat across from his pals and pack mates with a sharp grin. “I heard from Emma, who heard from Chloe, that she’s already burnt the jacket you gave her.”

Peter rolled his eyes. “I didn’t give it to her. She came on our date in a nonsensical top and near froze when we went to the theatre for our date. The jacket was meant to keep her warm. It wasn’t a gift. She just never returned it,” he rumbled.

He was sure she’d been expecting him to keep her close to keep warm. It was actually not a bad idea, but even then something had held him back and he’d given her the jacket instead, as it was still carrying his natural body warmth.

“Well it’s too late now,” Trey grinned, as a couple more women walked by, fluttering their lashes and smiling coyly at the handsome werewolves.

“Man, what the hell happened anyway? I feel like we’ve barely seen you recently. Besides, I thought you were gonna be gentle about the whole break-up deal?” Duke asked.

“Look, I tried, then she began throwing shit and making threats . . .”

Trey swung around from ogling the passing women to stare Peter down. “She threatened you? _You!?_ ”

“Yeah, it didn’t go so well from that point on,” he stretched, scrunching his shoulder blades together to ease some of the tension in his upper back.

Duke scoffed. “I’m surprised she’s still in one piece and not pieces.”

If there was one thing the pack knew, it was that Peter’s wolf tended not to be reasoned with when threatened. A threat to either man or pack was often dealt with swiftly and with significant prejudice. It’s one of the many reasons why he made a perfect choice for Enforcer.

The Directive though didn’t take too well to werewolves or vampires inflicting harm. He’d often wondered how and why other species were so much freer to interact. Why the Council did not treat them all as the scum they evidently thought they were. He knew the history behind the thing but he’d never understood why, with all the hatred the hunters had for supernaturals, why they hadn’t used the Directive as the excuse they needed to purge all of them. Hunters were after all the soldiers and henchmen of the Council.

Peter scoffed, “It was a near thing, but she has been warned and knows better now. Besides, the last thing we need is for the Council to be called in for any violence against a human.”

“Yeah,” said Trey, soberly. “Those damn hunters would love the chance for a go at us again. Keeping the peace, my ass,” he grouched, though quietly enough that it was not overheard by any except in their small circle.

Dissent toward the Council, its members or its hunters, was not allowed. In fact, the Directive mandated it as law:

_ RULE No. 7 _

  1. _Both species shall submit to the hierarchy of the local council. This shall include Officials of the Council and those appointed to carry out its’ justice. Disobedience or failure to comply with instructions is punishable by mandatory confinement of a period not less than eight months._



Duke sought to redirect the conversation. Talk of the Directive and its punishments often sent a cold flare of anger down his spine. Instead he asked of Peter, “So you guys are really done?”

“Yup,” Peter looked down at his food, having little to no appetite. His wolf had been whining all day for the sound of Stiles’ voice, for his smell, for some kind of interaction with him. It had been more than 12 hours since he last laid eyes on the vamp and he felt like his skin was stretching thin across his frame. Peter had been trying to be careful about how much he gave in to his wolf while trying to keep his illicit meetings with the vampire secret.

He knew – in fact, he’d thought long and hard about what it would mean after centuries of feuds between their kind, for him, an Enforcer of the most prominent pack on the East Coast, to be caught dallying with their ‘enemy’. The consequences of which he could not deny were dire; but he couldn’t control the longing both man and wolf felt for Stiles. Both wanted the vampire in a most unreasonable way.

“You ok, man?” Trey asked, and Peter tried to refocus his attention.

“I need to get outta here.” Peter stood suddenly, instead of answering the question.

“You want some company?” Duke asked, very willing to skip the rest of the afternoon’s schedule. Chemistry was a pain in his ass he didn’t need.

As if reading his mind, Peter halted his glee in its tracks. “Nope, you can’t miss anymore Chem classes, Duke. Remember what Talia said? Besides, I just need to clear my head. I’ll see you guys at home.”

Before either friend could comment further, he prowled out of the cafeteria. And before he even made it to the car his phone was already in his hand dialling. It went straight to voicemail, but the voice recording on the other end inviting the caller to leave a message was enough to have his wolf wriggling in satisfaction.

He was so far gone on that particular vampire it was no longer a question.

++++++

Stiles left Algebra wanting to punch Mr. Harris in his face. The man delighted in making him angry and he was one of the few vampire teachers they had in the school. He seemed to find a perverse joy at every class in showing up Stiles’ deficiencies. It didn’t help matters either that the man was on the Mayor’s advisory council and one of the people his mother looked to in this election season. Mr. Harris was also one of those who delighted in pointing out how Stiles’ flaws could hamper his mother’s chances. It was one of the reasons Stiles hated campaign season, and the Algebra teacher himself.

He dug his phone out of his pocket. Unlike his other classes where he could get away with leaving it on silent or vibrate, in Harris’ classes even that brought ridicule. So he’d gotten into the habit of switching the thing off completely for that hour-long lesson. So imagine his surprise when the phone vibrated to show he had a missed call and that familiar name “Harper” popped up.

He’d deliberated for four days before even assigning a name to Peter’s number. He’d been afraid to have too close of an identifier in his list that anyone would recognise as the wolf’s. Stiles knew it was crazy and impractical for anyone to even suspect that he’d have reason to be conversing with a wolf, and a Hale wolf, at that. But paranoia in this case might be a life saver, literally.

“Harper” was a new online pal he did some gaming with, so at least that was easy to flub about. But he had Harper’s contact under a different listing in his phone and used “Harper” as Peter’s identifier.

Standing with his phone in hand, his heart tripped; the first time it’d done that, and he felt like his cheeks were warming.

“You ok, Stiles,” Kira asked from suddenly behind him, looking mildly concerned. “Your face has gone red!” she said with some shock. Vampires were pale for a reason. A reason that had to do with their desire and need for blood and their lack of a real pulse to begin with.

Stiles lifted a hand to his cheeks and felt the momentary warmth. _What in the world was happening to him?_

“Just had algebra . . .,” Stiles tried to explain, as if that was an ample excuse.

“Oh . . . ok,” Kira responded, voice dropping as if that explained it all, when for Stiles it explained nothing about why a vampire was blushing at the mere fact that his mate had tried to call him earlier.

“Hey, do me a solid?”

“Sure, anything,” his friend nodded.

“Scott doesn’t have his bike today. Can you drop him off for me? I think I’m gonna head home. Not really feeling my best.”

“Should I call your mom or something?” Kira looked worried again; plus there was that other thing she wanted to talk to him about.

“I’ll call her from the jeep,” he promised, shaking his phone at her.

Kira didn’t look like she believed it, and as she opened her mouth to say something, Stiles rushed on, “Thanks, I owe you one.”

He hurried towards the exit, hoping he wouldn’t be stopped before he made it out.

++++++

Kira watched Stiles’ carefully slip away, checking his surroundings to make sure no admin was near. He’d been a lot happier lately, in a quiet, understated way like he was trying to contain it. Scott and the others had missed it, but she hadn’t. And he’d been checking his phone a lot more than before, even if he made excuses about gaming with some new online buddy. She wasn’t sure if that was the only reason. Something was up with Stiles. Something he was keeping from all of them.

She’d followed him out into the hallway because she’d wanted to privately ask him about later but he’d been in such a hurry and she didn’t buy that fib about calling his mother. He was usually better at lying than that. Plus, he hadn’t said anything all day about the plans for later and how he felt about it. With how secretive her parents were being about the whole matter, she was beginning to think Stiles didn’t know.

She had her own suspicions about what it meant that her parents refused to give her direct answers about why they were dining at the Lagan’s tonight. She groaned, really hoping that her fears were misguided because if they weren’t then this evening would go one of two ways – bad or catastrophic.

++++++

Peter sat in the lower bleachers, eyes on the edges of the Preserve bordering the football field, turning his phone over and over between his hands. His mind was a mess and his emotions all over the place.

Then his phone rang. He glanced at the screen and felt his whole body tingle and settle. He’d never, ever, felt like this before. This absolute knowing. This surety. As much trouble as came with it, it just felt like so _RIGHT_.

“Hi,” he said, finally answering on the third ring.

“Hey,” Stiles sounded winded on the other end.

“Everything ok?” Peter asked quickly, finding it strange that Stiles sounded out of breath. All manner of possible scenarios flitted through his mind. “What’s wrong?” His wolf was rising from where it’d been rolling around in excitement when Stiles first rang, now ready to tear and rend on the vampire’s behalf if he was in danger.

Stiles huffed and now Peter could hear the smile in his mate’s voice. “Nothing. You always worry too much. I was trying to sneak out of school without getting caught.” Stiles giggled like a child on the other end, voice going from a whispered hush, to bright in seconds.

It tickled Peter deep down in a satisfying way. He found himself grinning into the distance, phone pressed to his ear. “And why are you trying to skip school? Where are you going?” He heard the engine of Stiles’ jeep rev in the background.

“Ummm, I don’t know . . . Where am I going?” he asked suggestively.

Peter smirked again then chuckled. He refused to think of Rules or Directives or what should and shouldn’t be. Instead he asked quietly, “Meet me at our spot? Ten minutes?”

“We have a spot . . .,” Stiles said dreamily and giggled. “Of course we have a spot. Ok! See you soon,” he said in a jumbled rush, as there was a sound of him fumbling with his cell and a thump before the phone cut off. He’d likely dropped it, again.

Stiles had all the grace that went with his species, right up until he didn’t and would often trip over his own feet or drop things absentmindedly. _Ridiculous mate_ , the wolf thought and Peter chuckled to himself. Gathering his bag, he ran across the field, hopped the short fence and rushed deep into the Preserve. He had a fetching vamp to meet.

++++++

John looked up from his lap of fries and burger, sucking on another curly fry to see the familiar blue jeep blow past . . . on a school day . . . during school hours . . . with a boy in the driver’s seat who should be in school.

“Aww hell,” he muttered before hastily dropping the meal back into the bag it had come in and turning over the engine of his personal vehicle to follow.

By the time the engine turned on, the blue jeep he’d intended to give chase had already disappeared down a side street. At least the boy knew better than to travel down main and risk his mother or one of her cronies spotting the very distinguishable jeep.

But John knew Claudia would have his ass if anything happened to Stiles, even if it was on John’s day off, and this particularly curious boy had a particular penchant for finding trouble.

++++++

Stiles was tripping and giggling with joy as Peter’s arms wrapped around him and the man buried his nose in his neck, taking deep whiffs of his mate’s tantalising, hypnotic scent.

“That tickles,” Stiles laughed. “Don’t you have classes anyway?”

“Nothing that I can’t miss. Besides, you’re one to talk, sneaking out of school and all.”

Stiles sighed. “I had to see you. I couldn’t stop thinking about you and I wanted . . .” his rambling was cut short by Peter’s mouth.

++++++

“. . . I just don’t understand why he has to make my life such living hell!” Stiles flailed, sometime later, almost taking out Peter’s eye as the wolf dodged his elbow, smiling.

A worked up Stiles was a sight to behold, and utterly arousing. It was one of the first things Peter realised about him. He practically used his whole body to communicate, and it only got more energised when he was passionate about something.

“Maybe you shouldn’t let him get to you like that. Maybe that’s half the kick for him, to actually get under your skin.”

Stiles blew out a harsh breath between loose lips, flopping down on the grass beside Peter, dropping his head into the older man’s lap. “Well he does a damn fine job at it. I’m sure there’s someone, somewhere who could teach Algebra better. I know it.”

“Here, let me make it better,” Peter murmured and lowered his head to claim Stiles’ lips, cutting off the rant.

++++++

“She just won’t let it go. Now I’m getting two reactions – either girls are trying to come onto me, or they’re giving me the cold shoulder like I did something wrong. I can’t force my wolf to want her!” Peter said, as he sought to unburden his week.

“She actually threw a lamp at you?” Stiles snorted, deliberately not thinking about the chicks that were trying to gain the interest of his mate.

Peter narrowed his eye, grasping Stiles around the waist and pulling him back into his body as he proceeded to tickle the vampire. “It’s . . . not . . . funny, Stiles!”

Stiles’ peal of laughter rose on the wind, until he was breathless and wriggling to get away.

“Stop! Stop! Ok, I give in,” Stiles said, reaching up to frame Peter’s cheeks. “I know it hasn’t been easy that you’re going through all of this for little ole me.”

The wolf burrowed into his hands, enjoying the feel of his mate fondling his face and all but purring at the feeling. “I don’t want anyone else, Stiles. I just wish _she’d_ find someone and let this go. It’s not like I’m breaking vows to her or anything. We went on a couple dates, fucked a few times, that’s it!” he said, piqued.

When Peter realised what he’d said his cheeks flamed, and Stiles raised an unimpressed brow at him.

“I could really do without the blow by blow of what you did with her, thank you very much.” Stiles struggled to pull away, jealousy raising its head as he thought of the fact that Peter had been intimate with someone that wasn’t him.

“Damn! Babe, I’m sorry. She means nothing to me. You know that. You’re the one I want . . . the only one . . .”

Stiles closed his eyes and tried to rein in his emotions. He wasn’t being rational about it. Of course Peter wasn’t a virgin, unlike him, and as much as they’d fooled around, having sex with Peter would mean carrying Peter’s scent for all to notice. That was yet another thing The Directive was taking from them and it chaffed. He _wanted_ his mate, but that would mean certain discovery.

Peter pulled him more firmly into his body. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he whined, and Stiles could see the wolf poking through.

He threw his arms around Peter’s neck and within seconds the wolf was claiming his lips yet again, marking Stiles and not caring about consequences.

+++++

And that’s how he found them – locked in an embrace, Stiles’ fingers tunnelling through Peter’s hair, demanding, as the wolf tried to devour him as the vampire scrambled to straddle his lap. There was a desperation to their interlude that while frenzied, was still tender enough. The two were so gone on each other that it was like nothing else in the world mattered in that moment.

It was enough to make John yearn for what he’d been missing, but just as easily as to know the inherent danger in this. It had taken him more than an hour of tracking but he’d found Stiles . . . or rather, found “them”.

The Sheriff crouched low and watched in despair. His heart sinking to the soles of his boots at the reality of what he was seeing.

_No! No, no, no! It couldn’t be._

His history as a hunter had taught him many things, among them, how to hide his scent and sound when tracking a supernatural. But his history as Sheriff had taught him even more, primary among them, when disobedience of The Directive could result in dire consequences and he was looking at one such instance right then.

But maybe he was too long out of the hunting world because something must have tipped the couple off. He saw Peter Hale’s head snap up as he lifted the vampire and shoved him protectively behind him, prowling to his feet and shifting immediately to a crouched beta form, wolf eyes glowing yellow and fixed on John’s position in a gaze that promised that his own death was not very far in coming.

“ ** _Awww,_** **_hell_**!” John said reaching for his weapon as the wolf snarled his first and, likely, only warning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a comment as you go.


	8. Secrets of the Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seeming at a loss, Stiles turned to look at him. “We don’t have a choice anymore, do we?”
> 
> Peter reached out and pulled his mate into his arms, dropping his head into the crook of his neck as Stiles trembling arms curled around him. “No, I don’t think we do.”
> 
> “I’m scared, Peter.”
> 
> “I know,” he gulped air into his burning lungs. “I know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it’s been a few weeks since I last posted an update. I had plans to write while on holiday, but then I travelled and caught the flu, so my plans to post went right out the window. I rewrote this chapter and changed up how I wanted things to flow so many times that I hope this makes sense. By the end you’ll all guess some of the secrets, others will follow pretty quickly hereafter for obvious reasons, and the pace will pick up a bit. Enjoy.

“Stiles run!” Peter growled around sharp teeth and increasingly hairy jaws, a hand stretched behind him to keep Stiles back and out of any line of fire, sniffing the air at once for any other hidden dangers; sure they were about to encounter the Council and its judgement.

“No,” Stiles whined, glancing at the Sheriff who was moving to step out into the clear and had drawn his weapon.

“Peter, stop!” the Sheriff ordered, moving carefully from his crouched position to the side with weapon in hand so he could get an unobstructed view of both supers.

In a blur of movement and taking into account the shifted werewolf before him, John quickly exchanged the clips in his weapon – ejecting the single wolfs bane bullet he always kept racked in the chamber and snapping the “stunners” clip in place, loading the chamber as he implored the shifting wolf, eyes darting from wolf to Stiles and back.

He’d learnt when he’d abandoned his “duty” as a hunter and turned to the law that it made sense to carry various types of bullets at all times, whether among a civilian population or not. His brother, Chris, had taught him that. Supernaturals were not big on giving quarter when they felt threatened, especially werewolves. He really didn’t want to have to use the weapon. But Peter growled deeper and his shift accelerated, removing John’s preferred option of not having a weapon pointed at the Alpha’s brother and the Lagan’s heir.

The Sheriff heard a whimper that sounded like it came from Stiles, and quickly warned, “I don’t want to hurt you, but I need you to calm down. NOW, Hale!”

The use of his “official voice” seemed to have no bearing on the wolf whom Stiles clung to and tried to drag backward when the wolf took another step forward.

“Peter!” John heard Stiles’ plea and sent a brief prayer that the wolf would heed, but no such luck.

The Sheriff placed his finger on the trigger reluctantly as the wolf’s growls deepened yet again.

++++++

Both Peter and wolf were in full _protectmateprotectmate_ mode. He was prepared to attack, kill if he had to. At this point it didn’t matter that it was the Sheriff before him. He knew what their being together like this meant; and even worse, to be found out by the lawman.

“He’s seen us. You know what that means, Stiles!” his voice trembled at the threat of the situation, especially to his mate.

He heard the Sheriff’s heartbeat accelerate. “No! No, wait!” the man said, eyes widening as he looked at them pleadingly.

When he would have roared the man into silence, the Sheriff continued quickly, “That’s not . . . I’m not here to turn you in.”

The truth in the statement as evidenced in his heartbeat stalled Peter but a second before he remembered who John was. As a former hunter from one from the most ruthless of hunter families, he’d been taught from a young cub not to trust hunter heart beats in a pinch, instead to trust his own gut. His gut was telling him right now to get Stiles to safety.

But John’s next moved washed all his training and experience with hunters out the window. He heard the man exhale in a rush before he raised both weapon and his free hand in earnest – a universal sign of surrender.

Peter frowned and heard Stiles’ shocked inhaled whisper of, “What’s he doing?”

++++++

Very slowly John lowered the weapon back into the holster, when neither wolf nor vampire moved again. Both males looked at him suspiciously; the wolf still rumbling a continuous growl not trusting the sign of truce for a single moment.

John really hoped he was making the right decision and would not lose his life today because he’d surrendered his weapon too early. He was fast on the draw. When dealing with supers he had to be, but he wasn’t sure if in this particular instance he’d be faster than this particular wolf. Peter had a well-earned reputation for his ruthlessness in a fight.

Right now the werewolf was still keeping Stiles firmly behind him – a sign that pleased John, as the wolf seemed to be restraining his instincts at least. But it also scared him because a wolf only responded that way for Pack; pack or mate, and he could guess which applied now.

It was long moments of staring before John tilted his neck just a bit to mollify the wolf, allowing a shocked and still angry and anxious Peter to demand, “What do you want, Sheriff?”

“Just to talk.” John raised both hands again, empty palms facing the two.

“What about?” Peter growled, clearly not willing to admit to anything no matter what John had seen.

“Well it seems you boys might be in a bit of a pickle here. You do realise what could happen if anyone else had stumbled across what I have?”

Peter clenched his teeth in irritation. _Dammit!_

“How much?” he snapped, annoyed but willing to pay whatever the price to keep Stiles away from the danger their situation had put them in and the known punishment the Directive would demand.

++++++

Stiles hissed in offense, objecting and clutching Peter tighter. He’d never had much interaction with the Sheriff. In fact, despite his penchant for finding himself in the middle of controversy every so often, his mother had tried to keep him well away from anything violent. She always sent him off, out of earshot, if they ran into the Sheriff around town and he wanted a word with the Mayor. And after the first time she’d found Stiles buried nose deep in her private files about the goings on in Beacon Hills, she had taken “measures” to keep him out of her private safe. His mother was very particular about Stiles not listening in on “state business”, unless she deemed it important to his future as heir.

Despite all this, however, he’d never thought of the Sheriff as corrupt enough to try to extort money under any circumstance. From what little he knew, the man had never seemed like that kind of person before. _Had he been so wrong in his absentminded judgement of the lawman before?_

“I don’t want your money, Hale,” he heard the man say, looking pained at the suggestion that he could be bought; offended even. “I just want to help, if I can. And you both are going to need it if you intend to stay together, as mates or anything else.”

Stiles slanted a look at his mate, wanting but cautious to believe. “Why? Why would you want to help us?”

“I have my reasons.”

 _Reasons?!_ Stiles felt his hackles rise. _What possible reasons could he have for wanting to help them?_

Stiles’ fangs dropped and his eyes blazed as a thought came to him. He snarled at the man, stepping out from behind his mate to voice his disgust. “If you think I’m going to let you use this somehow against my mother or Peter’s Pack, then you’re sorely mistaken, old man!”

Despite his mother’s insistence that he stay away from the station and its officers, Stiles had had a run-in . . . or three . . . with the law before; so he knew of the rumours. He knew that John Argent, brother to hunter Christopher Argent and son to that scary as hell old man, Gerard Argent, used to be a hunter of their kind – just like his family. He’d reportedly given it up years ago for reasons no one really knew or certainly never answered to. The single time he’d asked his mother about it when he’d heard the rumour and thought the man fascinating, his mother had nearly bit his head off with her dire warnings to stay away from John Argent. It had been the first time he’d been afraid to disobey the Lagan. Now as he looked at the man, he wondered if his mother’s warning had indeed been warranted.

++++++

John, meanwhile oblivious to the thoughts flicking through Stiles’ mind, was so shocked by the “old man” sneer that his jaws dropped open. Surprised to his core he almost laughed at the spitting, spirited and enraged vampire before him.

 _God he was something to behold when he was riled! Just like his mother_ , he thought. But John forcibly got himself under control, trying to school his face into something professional as his insides swelled and bristled at the comparison his brain was making.

He forced the smile back again, but the pride glimmered in his eyes.

++++++

Watching the interaction between the two, Peter was aware that for some reason the Sheriff was pleased with Stiles’ response. The man’s scent had gone bright with happiness and something that smelled vaguely like pride – which in itself was puzzling. The whole scenario was weird, as a matter of fact, and something about the Sheriff’s smell tickled Peter’s nose and nudged at his brain.

Just then a gentle breeze took more of the man’s scent toward him. Mingled with Stiles’ own cinnamon and caramel with a hint citrus, the scent wafted into Peter’s sensitive nostrils and for a brief moment – really no longer than the time it took to take a breath – the wolf could not tell one from the other. His wolf peaked up at that and Peter sniffed more broadly this time.

The wolf frowned, looking between his mate and Sheriff Argent, as his brain started whirring and ticking over. _There was something in that smell . . . but what?_

He could only separate gun-oil, beef burger and fried potatoes mixed in with the Sheriff’s natural odour, but it was that odour that reminded him slightly of summertime grass and  . . . cinnamon, his mate’s signature scent.

++++++

Claudia closed the file she was working on and rose. She would check on the progress of dinner before going to select her and her son’s outfits for the evening. Left to his own devices Stiles would wear nothing but plaid – all the time, everywhere, and especially when he was feeling vindictive, which was pretty much every time he was associated with anything that would bring him into contact with Jackson Whittmore’s presence.

Besides, the smells from the kitchen were making it near impossible to get any work done. She wondered if Lysie would allow her to slip something to nibble on from one of the trays she knew would already be lining the surfaces in the massive kitchen.

Vampires didn’t need solid foods like most other species did. They could actually exist on blood alone, but to keep up with societal appearances, and political etiquette, they still liked to nibble on a few delicacies while entertaining. Besides, some foods were fun to nibble around; and Claudia especially loved fine dining. The richer the fare, the better. Her late husband had introduced her to several of the dishes she would serve tonight.

When she’d worked up the menu with Lysie, she’d purposely added those touches for the sake of her son. It was going to be difficult enough to get through the evening without Stiles rebelling at the role that would be outlined for him tonight – a role he would be expected to assume from this point forward during her campaign. She swallowed nervously and blew out a quick rushed breath at what she was sure would be a hell of an evening to come.

Stiles, she knew, missed Damian; still mourned his loss, despite the fact that he’d only been seven years old at the time, and meals like tonight’s helped to keep his memory alive. The jeep was becoming no longer enough to hold Stiles, to remind him of his duty. So she’d listened as her advisers told her the steps she would have to take now. He was old enough, now, they said, and should be expected to begin stepping into his responsibilities.

She knew her son felt a deep pain at not having a father around. If Damian had been here, so very many things would be different. Like her son, she mourned Damian’s passing, tragic as it was during that dreaded final chaos, when The Directive was forcibly implemented. She doubted many remembered or knew of a time when the werewolves and vampires weren’t enemies. She’d heard tales of it from gram, before she too passed, no longer wanting to live in a world where there were laws made specially to keep their races. Her mother had recalled a time when some of her greatest friends were other. A time when the hunters’ code meant something. Now these laws kept them apart; kept them from killing each other and the hunters from having mindless killing expeditions at their expense. It was a cross she carried with despair but with the expected grace of a leader.

She rounded the corner and pushed the thoughts to the back of her mind as the warmth of the kitchen embraced her. She smiled as Lysie came quickly forward to confer about the progress with the meal and the confirmation of their ten guests for the evening.

As they stood chatting lightly, Claudia pinching away at a brioche that would accompany the soup, Claudia reflected how much she missed having a male companion to entertain with. Their marriage might not have been a love match, but she did love Damian in her own way.

++++++

“It’s not blackmail, I swear. I just want to help.” John repeated, earnest.

Peter reached out and dragged Stiles back, surprising the vampire who had been creeping ever closer, however unconsciously, to the lawman.

John raised brows at Peter as he pulled Stiles into a loose embrace.

“I don’t want you any closer to him,” Peter whispered low, for Stiles’ ears only.

“What? Why?”

Peter paused, not sure what he wanted to say, just knowing something was amiss. Something other than them having been found out. _How did he explain what his nose was picking up?_ _How had no one ever noticed?_

Maybe he’d been gone too long; lost touch with a few things. He himself had only ever really noticed Stiles on his return to Beacon Hills. He’d taken off after Beacon Hills High and spent four years abroad – the first two at college and the last two just travelling across Europe. He’d returned for university after Talia had insisted it was time for him to rejoin the pack. He’d hated her for it at first, but as he was enveloped back into the fold, embraced by his nieces and nephews and Pack, he’d recalled what he’d loved about home before their mother had been killed.

But even so, there’d never been reason for the wolves to be close to vampires, and vampires clearly did not scent the way werewolves did. He and Stiles had had long discussions comparing the strength of their senses, their weaknesses, looking for ways to protect each other should the need arise.

“He isn’t lying about the blackmail,” Stiles whispered frowning again. “I’d have known if he was.”

But Peter’s brain was far too busy rolling over questions. He’d sworn to protect Stiles from any danger presented to them. Now he was faced with a threat that wasn’t quite a threat, with the possibility of a connection staring him right in the face, he balked at the obvious – even as he recognised the light dusting of freckles on the Sheriff’s skin and that particular twinkle in his eyes. But even if he could deny his own eyes, he could not his nose. But still he hesitated.

He couldn’t just blurt out, ‘ _What are you to Stiles?’_ At least not the way he wanted to. This was the one time he’d need finesse rather than brutality or manipulation or frank speak; because if his nose was telling him what he thought it was telling him, then there were things even Stiles didn’t know about himself.

So instead of the million-plus-one questions swirling in his brain, he simply said, “I still don’t trust him.”

++++++

“Laura, have you seen Peter? I’ve been trying to call him and I’m not getting through. I need him here this evening,” Talia said, frowning down at her cell as she replied to a text.

Laura swallowed but kept her face carefully blank with a small furrow in her brown. Her lips downturned as he replied, “No, Duke and Trey said he left campus early. He only text to say he wouldn’t be able to pick us up this evening. I figured something came up.”

The Alpha shook her head. “He’s been gone more than he’s been here recently. Something’s up and it’s more than this Imogen thing. Did you know she threatened him?”

“Yeah, Duke was going on and on about it. I think he wants to date her now that Peter’s cried off,” Laura said absently, sneering.

Talia rolled her eyes. Just what they needed, Duke going after Peter’s ex. But still, the question was what the hell was up with Peter lately.

“I just don’t get it. I thought he was finally settling in this last year, but that incident with the vampire on campus, then the wendigo, and now breaking it off with Imogen . . . I thought we’d talked it out and he was more comfortable with his role now. I just don’t know what’s going on with him anymore. I need to figure it out. We can’t afford any trouble now, especially not with the vampires so intense about this election.”

Laura tried to keep her heart steady. Tried not to let the panic enter her scent. Something was up all right and Laura would bet her next allowance that it had everything to do with the Lagan’s son. Her uncle was going to get himself killed for falling for a vampire.

++++++

Claudia glanced at the clock again. _Where the hell was Stiles?_ He promised he’d be there by 5, and it was gone eight minutes after now.

Their guests would be arriving by 6:30 and there were any number of things she wanted to double check before then, including making sure her son was clad as he should be. He’d been known in the past to sneakily alter his evening wear if she left him alone too long. Stiles hated formalities and ceremony.

She dialled his cell again and got voicemail a fourth time.

“Stiles, you’d better be on your way home, young man. You aren’t too old to be grounded yet!” she groused into the message.

She went in search of her personal phone book to find Melissa’s home number. Maybe Scott could shed a little insight on the whereabouts of her wayward and rebellious son.

 ++++++

As Stiles turned toward Peter, a cute frown drawing his brows together, John took a moment to study the werewolf. When he saw Peter inhale deeply his heart skipped a beat, causing Stiles to immediately swing eyes back in his direction.

“What’s going on?” Stiles asked, voice confused.

Peter quickly shook his head behind Stiles’ back and John knew for sure that Peter understood, that the wolf now knew. He swallowed thickly, goose-pimpled flesh going cold as his brain struggled for something to say; anything to mask this anxiety and to calm his heart. He knew better than most how sensitive the hearing of a vampire was.

Once again, the Hale wolf came to the rescue. “I think it’s just occurring to the Sheriff that he’s offering to help us hide our direct disobedience to a Directive. One of the most serious rules of the Directive and what it could mean for him.”

“Then why offer to help us? How can you even help us when you serve _them_?” Stiles did not even try to hide the scathing scorn in his voice.

The “them” Stiles referred to, John knew, was the Council. The ones who upheld and enforced the Directive’s harsh and, sometimes, deadly punishments. It was a position that brought John no joy, but at the same time allowed him to be the Council’s neutral voice among the militant enforcement mechanism that comprised mainly hunters.

That Stiles would abhor his role in such was a hard pill to swallow, but when he’d given up his hunter code for a legal one, he’d sworn to protect the supernatural community, whether they trusted him or not. It was a pledge he kept. If it meant that Stiles would never support who he was and had to be, even while John kept him, his clan and the werewolf community safe, he could live with that.

“Because keeping the supernatural community of vampires and werewolves safe in light of the Directive is what I do.” And this time there was no blimp in his heartbeat, because every word was the truth.

++++++

Claudia did not slam the receiver down the way she wanted to; with the frustration that was balled up in her limbs.

Scott had no idea where Stiles was; said her son had skipped the last few periods of school and disappeared. His jeep was also nowhere to be found around town – the next two calls told her that. The third was to activate her son’s phone and jeep trackers. When neither returned a location (her son was sometimes too smart for his own good), she knew what it meant. Stiles had disobeyed her and gone into the Preserve, again.

That he could be so reckless and thoughtless, especially now, made her spitting mad. Damn her mother (Stiles’ gram) for the tales she’d told Stiles before she died. Nana had regaled him with tales of lost loves and family feuds that had her son hunting forbidden ground for evidence of legends that had no place in current times. Legends best left alone. Legends that could get him killed.

She’d warned him before; forbidden his venturing into that place. If that was where he was tonight instead of here, where he should be, she’d ground him into infinity.

The Lagan dialled the one number she knew would be answered immediately.

++++++

“And you expect us to just trust you, with our lives?” Stiles huffed, when Peter stood uncharacteristically quiet at his back.

“No, I don’t expect blind faith; but I will prove to you in time that I can be trusted.” John said with a surety that had Stiles skeptical once more.

“Look,” John continued, “I know you have no reason to believe me. You don’t know me well enough to determine whether I can be trusted, but in light of the current situation, I think you’re both going to need someone’s help, and unless you’ve got a better option . . .” he trailed off, splaying hands wide before the two.

And he was right, Peter thought. They didn’t have options. In fact, he was surprised they’d lasted these past few months without incident. At the rate they had been going, they were lucky to be in this situation, rather than arrested and headed to a firing squad or for a beheading. They didn’t exactly have a choice here.

Besides, he needed the Sheriff alone. He had questions only the man could answer and he wasn’t willing to ask them in Stiles’ presence. He needed to know if he needed to protect his mate from more than just discovery of their bond. So his questions would wait, for now; but the Sheriff would answer them one way or another, of that he had absolutely no doubt.

++++++

Seeming at a loss, Stiles turned to look at Peter. “We don’t have a choice anymore, do we?”

The wolf reached out and pulled his mate into his arms, dropping his head into the crook of his neck as Stiles trembling arms curled around him. “No, I don’t think we do.”

“I’m scared, Peter.”

“I know,” he gulped air into his burning lungs. “I know.”

The two just held each other and it near broke John’s heart, almost as much as it scared the crap out of him.

Then a buzzing interrupted the silence. Taking his cell from his pocket, the Sheriff looked at the screen then squeezed his eyes tight. When he opened them he locked gazes with Stiles.

“Your mother.”

And Stiles trembled some more.

++++++

“Claudia?” John had walked several metres away to accept the call. He knew the two supers could still hear both sides of the conversation but it would hopefully lessen the Lagan’s ability to hear too much from his end.

“John, I can’t find Stiles. He was supposed to be home half hour ago to prepare for the dinner tonight. His phone’s off and his jeep is MIA . . . I think he may have gone into the Preserve again after that damn legend. You have to find him.”

“I’m sure he’s ok. I’ll see what I can find out and call you right back.”

“Find him, John. You know what it means if he goes down this road.”

John swallowed. “I’ll find him.”

“Thank you.”

++++++

Stiles stood shock still. _What did his mother mean about it being dangerous? Did she know more than she’d told him she did? Did the Sheriff?_

But then he felt Peter stiffen too and could guess his mate was now wondering once again at his secret trips into the Preserve. He could practically feel the questions building on the tip of his mate’s tongue. When he turned to look at Peter, the wolf’s eyes were sober.

“I think it’s time you told me what’s in these woods that you’ve been searching for.”

Stiles’ lips fell open at his mate’s demand. He didn’t know where to start, and he had a dinner to get to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A hell of a lot happens in this chapter. A few secrets are easy to guess, but the hint of mystery raises its head again. I think it’s pretty obvious now that John is a little bit more than just an Argent Sheriff in this story; and evidently Peter is now clued in to that, plus the fact that Stiles is keeping secrets.   
> I’m still recovering from this dreaded illness, but I think I can get a bit more done soon. Let me know your thoughts, please and thanks for reading.


	9. Duties of the Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You really need to let it go,” John said, turning the second last corner before the Mayoral mansion would come into view.
> 
> “I can’t,” Stiles said, eyes out the window and trying not to jiggle his leg.
> 
> John sighed. They’d been engaged in some version of this tango since they left the preserve, in John’s car – him trying to persuade Stiles to give up his pursuit of “the legend”; Stiles telling him to butt out as it was none of his concern. John wished he could, but there were implications here of which Stiles was not even aware, and shouldn’t ever. He’d need to talk to Claudia and get her to really listen this time. He shuddered to think of what would happen otherwise. If the wolves and vampires thought the Directive was a pain in the ass now, then they really didn’t know the hell that could be unleashed if certain things came to light. He needed to keep Stiles out of this, somehow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeaaaa, so I'm writing again. Sorry for the very long drought. Thoughts welcomed.

Peter stared at his mate and watched as a flush briefly stained his face before disappearing. He could all but hear the wheels turning over in Stiles' brilliant, big brain.

Each time he’d asked about his love’s trips into the Preserve in the past, Stiles had found some way to distract him, and let’s face it, his mate was a distraction all by himself. And realising that he was not ready to reveal his reasons, Peter had pretended to forget about the questions he’d begun asking since after their first encounter with the wendigo. A few times on his surveillance of the boundaries, he’d thought he had caught the scent of his mate, but tossed it off as just being his imagination since Stiles was so much on his mind. Now he wondered how much of that was his clever mate finding a way to disguise his scent. Peter wouldn’t put it pass him to have found a way – after all, he’d mastered masking Peter’s presence in his home from his own mother, the Lagan.

“Peter . . .” Stiles twisted his fingers together, fidgeting and casting furtive glances between him and the Sheriff.

Before Stiles could decide which tale to tell this time, the Sheriff quickly interrupted the two. “Look, as much as I’m sure this is a conversation you deem important to have, right now I need to get him home before his mother sends someone else to look for him. Someone who won’t understand . . . _this_ ,” he gestured between the two of them.

For a second Peter wondered why the Sheriff was the one who “ _understood . . . this”_. Then his nose reminded him of why. He really needed to talk to the man about his ‘hidden’ connection to Stiles, and soon. It would worry him until he knew all.

Stiles eyes fell to his shoes. He was a tad bit ashamed of how much relief he felt at the reprieve he was being given. A reprieve that wasn’t really much of one, but would nevertheless provide the cover for the escape he needed now while he figured out how to tell Peter what he knew. I could change things. In fact, if he was right about his suspicions, it could change _everything_.

“I also need to come up with a plausible scenario as to where you were while your mother was trying to track your whereabouts. So we’d better get going,” John suggested.

“Yea, ok.” He huffed a breath before hesitantly meeting Peter’s serious eyes. “I promise I’ll explain everything.”

“I’ve heard that before Stiles, and I still know no more than when we first met,” Peter said tiredly, disappointment showing through in his voice, and Stiles felt a bit more ashamed of himself.

“I know, and I’m sorry.” Stiles walked forward to press a dry kiss to Peter’s lips before turning around to follow the Sheriff.

Peter sighed. “Stiles, do something about your scent before you get home. Vampire noses may not be the best, but they’re better than human ones and you smell of werewolf . . . Sheriff . . . I will see _you_ later.”

John glared at the wolf without response as Stiles lifted his shirt to his nose to test the strength of werewolf scent lingering on him. He’d been practically rolling around in Peter all evening. He hadn’t missed the warning in Peter’s tone to the Sheriff either, but he already felt like his brain was about to overload with worrying about how his mother was going to respond to his having lost track of time on this particular evening, so he just silently followed the lawman. He’d worry about any private conversations between his mate and the Sheriff later, when he wasn’t scared to death about the consequences of having lost track of time, especially today.

++++++

Claudia threw open the door at the first ring of the bell, hoping it was John delivering her wayward teen.

It was the Yukimuras. She hugged Mrs. Yukimura and shook her husband’s hand, while smiling gently at Kira. She could see the nerves just under the surface of all three vampires. The Yukimuras were old money, from families as old as the Stilinskis – both from Old Europe.

“Come in, come in,” she said as a servant calmly divested them of their coats and outer wear.

“Is Stiles getting dressed?” Kira asked softly, “Can I go up to say hi?”

She ignored the displeasure that immediately marked her parents’ faces. She had no doubt they were suspicious of her intentions. And rightly so. What she really wanted was a few minutes alone with Stiles before the evening started. Before the **plan** was revealed and both she and one of her best friends were painted into a position neither of them could escape.

For just a second Kira thought she saw something hesitant flash in the Lagan’s eyes, but just as quickly the woman was smiling.

“Oh, dear, unfortunately he’s not here right now. He had to run a quick errand but should be back any moment. I didn’t want him ruining his evening wear, you know how Stiles can get. So when he gets back he’ll be rushing to get dressed. I’m sorry, but there won’t be time for quick visits.” The Lagan turned the bright but brittle smile on her guests, “And for that I must apologise because I just know he’ll probably be a little late to our gathering. But do get comfortable and thank you so much for coming.”

Another servant showed the guests into the sitting room, as two others arrived in short order.

“Ma’am?” a timid voice called, and she turned to find her assistant holding out her cell. “An urgent message for you.”

Claudia hurriedly grabbed the phone and unlocked the screen. The message was from John. He had Stiles, found him on the outskirts of town, he claimed, but was on the way to the house. She exhaled and nodded a thanks to her assistant, handing the phone back.

“Let me know the minute Stiles arrives,” she ordered.

“Right away, ma’am.” The non-descript girl disappeared as silently as she had appeared.

Claudia refused to allow her anger to show. _What could Stiles have been thinking? And why was he in town when he should have been home getting dressed?_

++++++

“You really need to let it go,” John said, turning the second last corner before the Mayoral mansion would come into view.

“I can’t,” Stiles said, eyes out the window and trying not to jiggle his leg.

John sighed. They’d been engaged in some version of this tango since they left the preserve, in John’s car – him trying to persuade Stiles to give up his pursuit of “the legend”; Stiles telling him to butt out as it was none of his concern. John wished he could, but there were implications here of which Stiles was not even aware, and shouldn’t ever. He’d need to talk to Claudia and get her to really listen this time. He shuddered to think of what would happen otherwise. If the wolves and vampires thought the Directive was a pain in the ass now, then they really didn’t know the hell that could be unleashed if certain things came to light. He needed to keep Stiles out of this, somehow.

John would return and ensure there was no evidence of wolf on or in Stiles’ vehicle before he drove it back to the house at the edge of the Preserve. Stiles had hesitantly told him it would be better to leave it at the house than drive it to the mansion tonight with so many eyes watching. He’d also been adamant about not discussing his trips into the Preserve.

“The peace is too fragile for you to be digging around out there, Stiles,” John said. “You could get hurt.”

He pulled the car around to the back of the mansion. He knew Claudia well enough to keep out of sight dropping Stiles off.

“Why do you even care?” Stiles snapped, nerves frayed. “It has nothing to do with you. I’m not your concern. Besides, _Peter_ would never allow any of his family to hurt me,” the boy hissed. He knew better than to mention Peter’s name clearly on these premises for any to hear. He slammed the car door and sped up the back stairs to the kitchen entrance.

 _That’s where you’re wrong_ , John thought. _You are my concern. You’ve always been and this time it’s not the wolves I’m worried about. In fact, the wolves are the least of my worries._

John put the car in gear and drove back toward the Preserve to fetch the distinctive blue jeep, his mind in turmoil.

++++++

Stiles slipped into the kitchen and came face to face with Lysie. She took one look at him, then a gentle sniff before her eyes widened.

“Are you crazy? Shower, now, and douse those clothes in Calpa before your mother gets up there. Go!”

“Thanks!” Stiles squeaked and streaked up the back stairs to his room.

Lysie whipped a can from under one counter and spritz the air, then did the same with the stairways Stiles had just taken, swallowing heavily as her heart pounded. She glanced up the stairs where the boy had just disappeared with concern. He’d smelled like wet wipes, sweat . . . and there was a very distinct scent of wolf on him. She swallowed again.

Lysie had served the Stilinski’s a long time, and she loved the little trouble maker like a little brother; but this, associating with wolves, was inviting more than a little trouble into the vampire sphere. His mother would never understand it. Lysie didn’t understand it. She thought he’d given up trying to befriend wolves after the fiasco when he was seven. And now, in an election year no less, it was even more inconvenient for the Lagan’s son, _their heir_ , to be tempting fate like this.

++++++

The Sheriff waved Jordan off and proceeded to climb into the jeep. The deputy would drive his car and drop it off at his house before walking back to the station, which was a mere few blocks away. He trusted Jordan to keep this all quiet, and furthermore, not to question anything he saw.

As the headlights disappeared John revved the engine of Stiles’ jeep, turning on the lights. As he was about to reverse he saw a pair of glowing eyes in the rear view mirror and sighed heavily. He switched off the engine, knowing it was useless and very unwise to try evading Peter Hale tonight.

He threw open the door and stepped out. His huff was twice as heavy as he said, “I guess now’s as good a time as any. What do you want, Hale?”

“What are you to him?” Peter asked, taking several steps up to the Sheriff.

“I think we both know you’ve already guessed the answer to that question,” John said without inflexion.

“Then why doesn’t Stiles know about you. Why doesn’t anyone?”

John clenched his teeth. “You know who my family is . . . **_What_** my family is. How long do you think it would take my father to invent some reason to get his hands on my son, if he knew he existed and what he was? How long do you think it’d be before some ‘accident’ befell him?”

Peter growled at the mere thought, as John continued, “Knowing Gerard, and I _know_ you know of him even if you don’t know him . . . believe me, I know him and he would not allow a vampire to carry Argent blood for long. It would threaten the Argent name and all the influence it has. It’s safer for Stiles to know nothing about me. It’s best he continues to think of Damian as his father.”

Peter frowned as he felt alarm course through his blood. Alarm for what this could mean for Stiles. Alarm at the knowledge he now had, which he could not afford to keep from his mate. Which he did not feel comfortable keeping from his mate.

“You all got together and decided to keep this from him. Do you know what it’ll do to him when he finds out?”

The righteous indignation that had been burning deep down in Peter to get every answer he could out of the former hunter, fizzled and sputtered in the face of what he had suspected ever since he could a good sniff of the Sheriff. Now though . . . to be told that his suspicions were confirmed left him with more than a few more concerns.

“You and the Lagan . . .”

When Peter trailed off John raised one imperial eyebrow at him, lips going pinched.

“What Claudia is . . . was, to me is none of your business.”

“But this means that Stiles . . .” he trailed again, this time frowning, his deeply pinched. “He’s not a pure blood.”

John’s face immediately went blank and he said nothing.

“Ok . . . ok,” Peter continued when it was clear he’d get no comment. “Does this have anything to do with why he’s been sneaking around out here?”

For long moments it seemed like he wasn’t going to get an answer there either before John sighed tiredly. “That I can’t tell you. But I will warn you that if you care about him, at all, you’ll get him to leave it all alone. This thing he’s obsessed with. He doesn’t understand the ramifications of what he’s doing.”

“What ramifications? What’s he been doing?” Peter’s eyes narrowed.

Glancing at his watch John jingled the keys in his hand, looking at his son’s mate and deliberately ignoring the rushed questions and the glare focussed on him. “If you love him, really love him, you’ll end _this_ , this _thing_ between the both of you before it’s consummated and I assume that hasn’t happened because the Lagan isn’t out for your blood yet.”

“I can’t leave him,” Peter was at pains to note. “He’s my mate, Sheriff. I could no more live without him now than I could the air.”

John’s eyes were hard and he closed them tightly before he grated out, pained: “You know what lies at the end of this road you two seem determined to travel on. _You know_ , Peter. I can only hide this for so long so you don’t get my son killed. But if you don’t stop you _will_ get him killed, and if that happens, there’s no Alpha that will save you from me.”

The threat lay on the air between them as the Sheriff turned and got back into the blue vehicle, revving it once again and driving out of the Preserve.

++++++

Stiles was in the shower when he heard the door close. Without checking he already knew who it was. He quickly rinsed, slipping a hand out the stall to be handed a towel by his mother.

“You want to tell me where you were? You know how important this evening is! What could you have been thinking disappearing like that? All our guests are here, waiting . . .” she hissed at him as he pulled the towel around his waist.

“I’m sorry. I lost track of time, mom. I promise I’ll be down soon and I’ll apologise to everyone,” he pled, tired and unsettled.

Claudia wasn’t mollified. “We’ll talk about this later. Now you have to hurry.” She spun, stalking out of the room with a grace she never seemed to lose, even when furious.

Stiles exhaled and swallowed around the lump in his throat. He rushed out into his bedroom, turning on the overhead fan and turning up the air condition as he hurried to get dressed. How could he have been so careless, especially tonight? Being with Peter had swept everything out of his head and that was careless, careless and dangerous.

++++++

From the time Peter opened the front door he smelled the distress. Laura hurried to him, taking him by the arm and propelling him right back out the door.

“Have you lost your mind?” she growled at him as she tugged him down the front stairs, glancing behind them as if something was on their very tails.

“What?!” Peter began, but an angry growl from Laura had him biting off anything else that he might have been about to add.

She dragged him back into the Preserve he’d moments ago left behind, putting the Pack house in their rear view. He kept up with her hurried pace for another three minutes or so before she abruptly let go of his arm and swung on him, eyes burning yellow and emotions smelling of fury.

“I’ve had to make up lies to mom all evening about your recent disappearances, and you have the audacity to walk up the front steps smelling of vampire?” Laura’s voice was low, but there was no mistaking the absolute ire behind it.

Peter’s eyes widened, chagrined. He’d moments ago warned Stiles about cleaning his scent and after everything he’d forgotten himself. He whined, closing his eyes tight, ashamed.

Perhaps it was this evidence of him in obvious pain over whatever it was he was going through that caused Laura’s scent eased from fury to concern. Her brows furrowed as she asked, “What’s going on Peter?”

He looked at her for a moment, wondering if he even dared. He needed to talk with Stiles first but his conversation with the Sheriff had left him unsettled, confused, and mostly worried. John had been right. If they continued these private trysts it wouldn’t be long before they were discovered by someone other than the biological father that his mate knew nothing about, and that could easily result in their deaths. Neither Alpha nor Lagan could prevent the judgement of the Council if they were discovered, and the Council’s army, comprising mostly of hunters would delight in their deaths. They needed no reason to rejoice in the deaths of anyone not human. He was sure it would be a very public execution to serve as a deterrent to anyone else who sought to flout the Laws of The Directive.

“Talk to me. I can’t help if you don’t talk to me,” she pleaded with him.

He took a breath before responding. “That’s just it, my darling niece,” he tucked a stray strand of dark hair behind her ear. “I’m not sure you can help me this time, and if I involve you further in any of this, I don’t know where or how it will end.”

Laura visibly tensed but suddenly lifted her shoulders to stand tall, despite still being several inches shorter than her older uncle. “Why don’t you let me decide whether I can or can’t help my pack mate, my family? What’s happened? What could make you take such a chance as this, with a vampire, our sworn enemies?”

He paused so long, only the sounds of the preserve and their breathing to disturb the air.

“He’s my mate, Laura,” he said with resignation.

And Laura gasped. “Oh shit! Are you sure? I mean, of course you’re sure. You’re never not sure . . . but how is this possible. I didn’t think that was possible. This shouldn’t be possible.”

Peter grasped her arms tightly to stem the flow of babble, answering all the questions with, “I don’t know. It shouldn’t be . . . at least that’s what we’ve been led to believe. There’ve been rumours before . . . when the fighting started again . . .”

Laura’s terror melted into grief, “When we lost grandma . . . but Peter, that was just gossip, right? Surely you this is some kind of anomaly? The Council, the Council said this couldn’t happen.”

“Well clearly the Council was mistaken . . . or they lied to us. I mean, really, how would they know what’s impossible if they’ve decreed we are to have not contact with each other. How can they really know?”

His niece was silent for a long moment and all around them the Preserve seemed to be holding its breath.

“I mean . . . I thought it was just you being reckless . . . stirring up shit like you always do for shits and giggles. I never would have guessed . . .” The future Alpha stared off into the distance before her gaze slowly drifted back to her uncle. “They will kill you for this. They will kill you both.”

“Yes . . .”

“I’m scared, Peter. What will they do to the rest of us? The pack?”

Peter exhaled. “Now you see why I wanted you to know nothing else?”

She nodded shakily. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know yet, but I can no more stay away from him than he can from me.”

“What can I do?” Her question shocked him. “Well I can’t just leave you to face a potential execution squad,” she threw a narrowed glare at his surprised reaction. “Plus, the pack . . .”

“I won’t have you endangering yourself this way. You’ve done too much as it is already. I’ll think of something. I swear this will not come back on Tal or any of you. I swear it!”

She huffed her dissatisfaction at his response. “We’ll make sure of it.”

He narrowed his eyes at her bull-headed attitude. She was too much like her mother sometimes. Too much like him. Once her mind was made up, it was hard to move her an inch. He pulled her into a tight hug and she wrinkled her nose.

“But first, let’s get the smell of vamp off you before mom saves them all the trouble and kills you herself.” Her lips twisted slightly. They both knew that after the death of her parents any execution squad would have to fight its way through the Alpha to get to any of the pack. And that thought worried them both.

Laura just hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

++++++

Instead of hurrying down the winding staircase, Stiles took his time, to present a calm and composed visage. Less chance of tripping over his own feet and embarrassing his mother further. It wasn’t until he got to the end and swung into the sitting room from which the voices where coming that he spotted Kira.

He’d only had a moment to register his surprise before his mother came forward to hug him. He kissed her cheek and summoned a smile for her. He knew he was far from out of the fire and his mother would interrogate him later. His eyes met hers and for a moment his mother looked away, almost with a guilty countenance he didn’t understand. She hurriedly took him around the room, surprisingly saving the Yukimuras for last.

When Kira looked at him, she too seemed a bit apologetic and Stiles felt his confusion and wariness ramp up. It was now clear that there was more going on tonight than the regular business or election campaign dinner. He turned eyes on his mother, who quickly said, “Everyone, thank you for your patience and I once again apologise for keeping you all waiting. Please, let’s proceed to dinner.” With a wave of her hand, the murmuring moved into the dining room.

“Mom,” he whispered as her hand delicately clasped his elbow for him to escort her in to dinner. “What’s going on?”

“I have some news, but later.”

He glanced once more at Kira and knew that she and any other vampires present would have overheard. Kira’s brows drew down in what Stiles could only decipher as sorrowful. She looked up at him, her expression shifting to one he could barely parse, but her mimed words to him were very clear . . . And he wondered what his friend had to be sorry about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't know how long this current spurt of inspiration will last, but I hope long enough to get it finished.Thanks for reading.


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